Standing on the slope where the heavenly light was dense, Qin Ming looked up toward the edge of the colossal pit and sighed. "As an old friend, I've truly done all I can. Whether you can catch this colossal immortal fortune is up to you now."
Zheng Maoze had never felt so tormented in his life. The sect-guarding artifact from a thousand years ago lay right before his eyes—the ancient vessel he had yearned for in his dreams, capable of bringing him near-immortality!
Yet if he reached out to seize it, he would likely become the target of everyone present.
Numerous mysterious runes were carved into the furnace body, glowing radiantly. The dazzling divine glow shone onto his face, and the immortal mist steaming from the furnace mouth carried a faint medicinal fragrance that drifted into his nostrils.
How could he resist? The scent stirred his very soul.
Most tantalizing of all, it was right before him, well within arm's reach!
It was a near-immortal item, capable of gathering celestial essence from beyond the night curtain every day. Consuming it daily could purify the physical body, reshape the skeletal frame, and elevate the spiritual light of consciousness.
Zheng Maoze yearned for it desperately, yet he feared being intercepted by everyone. He was already injured; fleeing with the Eight Trigrams Furnace in tow would hardly be swift.
That single instant felt like a decade of agonizing struggle in his mind. Sweat poured down his face, and his body trembled slightly.
Who wouldn't want to become a near-immortal being? This might be the greatest opportunity of his entire life!
Zheng Maoze reached out, his fingers touching the rune-covered furnace. A sense of profound satisfaction washed through him.
Pfft!
Blood erupted from his back, two of his bones snapping from the impact.
"I'm not trying to fight for it, I just wanted to touch it!" Zheng Maoze screamed. In that final moment, through sheer willpower, he severed his greed and suppressed the restless fire within his heart.
He had only wanted a brief touch so that looking back in the future, he wouldn't feel too much regret—at least he would have touched a near-immortal item!
He had assumed a fleeting possession wouldn't trigger disaster, yet in the spark of a flint, someone had struck at him with lethal force. Several fellow disciples had been lying in wait nearby: some poking their heads out from behind bluestones, others crawling up from fissures in the earth.
"Zeng Yuan, this colossal immortal fortune is yours!" Spitting out a mouthful of bloody foam, Zheng Maoze hurled the Eight Trigrams Furnace toward someone close to him.
He wasn't doing his family friend a favor; he was acting out of sheer fury. Among the figures that had emerged behind him was this very friend. Though Zeng Yuan hadn't struck yet, he had already drawn a spiritual saber refined from lightning-struck wood.
Zeng Yuan was utterly bewildered. When the furnace, wreathed in immortal light, landed in his hands, it felt like a dream. Had his heart's desire manifested into reality? His lips quivered.
Then, clutching the furnace, he turned and bolted!
Zheng Maoze exhaled a breath of turbid air. Though drenched in cold sweat, he had finally escaped that deadly predicament. Just touching the Eight Trigrams Furnace had punched a bloody hole in his back; a moment later, he might have been blasted apart.
Resentment burned within him. Not a single person had shown any regard for their shared sect ties, striking with ruthless, underhanded venom.
Then came a hollow pang of loss. Had he not broken eighteen bones earlier, he would have grabbed the furnace and run no matter what, with a strong chance of making it!
"Who was so generous as to toss the Eight Trigrams Furnace to me?" He had only caught a fleeting glance earlier. Looking down now, he saw a hazy yet familiar figure waving and nodding toward him.
"You absolute bastard..." Zheng Maoze's body shook violently. Wasn't that the Six Imperial Styles practitioner who had shattered more than a dozen of his bones? Teeth clenched, his face turned livid. That fellow knew the state of his body, which was precisely why he had sent him such a 'magnificent gift'!
"Zheng Dazhuang, don't say I didn't care about our old friendship. You just failed to grasp this fortune yourself," Qin Ming murmured with a soft sigh, turning his eyes away.
Covered in blood, Zeng Yuan stumbled and swayed. He was in even greater agony than Zheng Maoze; because he had held the Eight Trigrams Furnace longer, the attacks raining down on him had doubled.
Lacking the requisite strength, he had no way to keep a near-immortal item, nor could he outrun the others.
Had people not known he was exceptionally close to Li Qingxu, he likely would have fared even worse.
"Zeng Yuan, over here!" Wang Caiwei waved at him, leading several people in rapid approach.
At the crucial moment, Zeng Yuan summoned every ounce of his strength and hurled the Eight Trigrams Furnace toward the pit. He had spotted Li Qingxu's figure. Pragmatic to the core, he knew that if he had to give it away, it should go to a core disciple.
The sweet smile that usually graced Wang Caiwei's face froze instantly. For a split second, a terrifying wave of conscious spiritual light expanded from her body.
Zeng Yuan felt a twinge of doubt. Was he hallucinating after being so badly battered? For a moment, he thought he had heard the sonic boom of Wang Caiwei furiously throwing a punch.
Without question, a fierce battle erupted in the pit. Several core disciples clashed violently; wherever the Eight Trigrams Furnace landed now, it would trigger bloody conflict.
The other disciples no longer dared to participate, keenly aware that the gap between them and the core disciples was simply too vast.
Tang Xumi, Jiang Shengyu, Hu Tingwen, Su Jingshu, and Li Qingxu—the five core disciples broke into a chaotic, intensely fierce melee.
They knew full well that no one else posed any threat to them. Only the five of them were true rivals, and the contest had reached its final stage.
On the slope, Pure Yang blood clung to their bodies, circulating with glaring golden light. As they traded blows, the rim of the pit collapsed and massive boulders tumbled down, unleashing tremendous destructive force.
Luo Qingge and Sun Jingtian were already out. Earlier, when confronting Cui Chonghe while he possessed someone, both had been gravely wounded. The core disciples had kept quiet about it, however, so the others still did not know that Cui Chonghe had entered the fray.
Evidently, when driving Cui Chonghe out, this small circle had reached certain unspoken terms with him in secret.
Rumble!
Like thunderclaps detonating, the five masters' spiritual light of consciousness collided, tearing open the sidewalls of the pit. Millstone-sized boulders plunged downward in dense clusters, resembling a mountain torrent bursting forth.
In this area where heavenly light was thin, they dared to unleash their conscious spiritual light, making the clash all the fiercer.
Qin Ming frowned deeply. The strength of these core disciples was truly terrifying, far greater than he had imagined.
The arrow he had loosed at Li Qingxu spoke volumes. Forged from glittering blue jade iron, it was of the same caliber of rare material as his mutton-fat jade iron saber, carrying his formidable, fused heavenly light.
An arrow shot with such power had merely torn the flesh of Li Qingxu's palm without damaging the bone, clear proof of the man's profound cultivation.
Against anyone else, Qin Ming's special arrow would likely have blown their body apart—or, at the very least, shattered an arm or hand to pieces.
*The path of those beyond the mundane world truly has no weaknesses. First birthing the spiritual light of consciousness, they later temper their bodies with extraordinary forces, vastly enhancing their physical constitution without flaw.*
Qin Ming pondered. No wonder people beyond the mundane world held themselves in such high esteem, constantly preaching the distinction between immortal and mortal, believing their path was superior—a golden highway.
Qin Ming felt no sense of defeat. His realm was still low, having undergone only his sixth Newborn transformation. Only when he truly stepped into the domain of the Outer Sage and compared himself with the core disciples from the outer realm would he know who was truly stronger.
He walked up the slope to a shattered stretch of ground where the five core disciples had fought, locating his translucent blue jade iron arrow.
After being injured, Li Qingxu had quickly engaged the other core disciples and had no time to worry about the arrow. Stained with blood, it had been left behind.
Enduring cold and hunger in Black-White Mountain over the past two years had instilled frugal habits in Qin Ming, so naturally he had to retrieve such a precious arrow.
In the distance, the warring Li Qingxu felt something. His eyes flashed like two streaks of lightning, casting a cold glare across the distance, as if committing Qin Ming's face to memory.
Along the pit's edge, many outer realm disciples looked down with expressions of awe, astonished that this Outer Sage was such a ferocious figure—daring to shoot at Li Qingxu, and actually managing to wound him.
Among the five core disciples, Jiang Shengyu was steadily losing ground. He had previously joined Tang Xumi, Su Jingshu, and others in besieging Li Qingyue and had suffered heavy wounds; he could hold out no longer.
Coughing up large mouthfuls of blood, his conscious spiritual light dimmed, making him the first of the five core disciples on the verge of elimination. Jiang Shengyu fled at once; staying any longer meant risking death on the spot.
At this moment, no close friendships or sect bonds mattered. Even those who were once like brothers fought with bloodshot eyes, driven solely by the desire to obtain the Eight Trigrams Furnace, drink celestial essence daily, elevate their physical bodies and conscious spiritual light, and approach immortality in the future!
Li Qingxu spat a mouthful of blood, his condition clearly unstable as well. He withdrew voluntarily, yet stepped forward to block Su Jingshu, who was also wounded.
"Hu Tingwen, you owe me a favor. I'll hold one off for you!" Li Qingxu called out.
He signaled that he could no longer fight a full-scale battle, but could still hold back the similarly weakened Su Jingshu.
"Very well. Brother Li, many thanks!" Hu Tingwen nodded, then turned to face Tang Xumi with everything he had. The final contest would unfold between the two of them.
The corner of Tang Xumi's mouth twitched. Earlier, he and Li Qingyue had pursued Li Qingxu together, but failing to drive him away completely had now come back to bite him.
In truth, though Li Qingxu was injured, he still had the strength for one more fight. But he knew Li Qingyue was lurking somewhere in the shadows, yet to show herself.
He had wanted Li Qingyue to clash with Tang Xumi and Hu Tingwen, but had failed to locate her true body.
He felt no obligation to warn the others, largely out of concern that if he provoked Li Qingyue into showing herself, she would focus her lethal strikes solely on him.
He deemed it better to keep Li Qingyue calm for now. Once he got his hands on the near-immortal item, it would be too late for her to stop him even if she appeared.
Li Qingxu still had a trump card: a wondrous escape art taught by his master. As long as he was willing to burn his origin, even someone who had just stepped into the third major realm might not catch him.
However, in that state, he could only flee, not fight.
What he wanted most right now was for things to stay stable. The moment he grasped the Eight Trigrams Furnace, everything would be settled!
He felt a dark anger. Twice he had been on the verge of seizing the near-immortal item: once thwarted when his hand was shot, and the second time when Zeng Yuan threw it toward him, only for Tang Xumi to intercept it.
Presently, the Eight Trigrams Furnace had temporarily fallen into Tang Xumi's hands.
After forcing Su Jingshu back, Li Qingxu pulled back a sufficient distance, and the two temporarily ceased fighting.
"Tang Xumi, I have high hopes for you. You ought to defeat Hu Tingwen," Li Qingxu muttered under his breath while gasping for air, secretly wishing for Hu Tingwen's defeat.
At the same time, he was quite tense, terrified that Li Qingyue would lose her patience and step out right now.
A moment later, the edge of the pit suffered a massive collapse. Both Tang Xumi and Hu Tingwen were undeniably formidable; their conscious spiritual light slashed like heavenly blades, and the divine glow within their Yellow Courts surged violently, as if warping the very space around them. Countless millstone-sized rocks sheared off the cliff face, plummeting toward the bottom like a roaring waterfall.
Hu Tingwen coughed up blood. Unable to match Tang Xumi, he stumbled backward in retreat, his face full of bitterness. A near-immortal item had been right within his grasp; he had needed to defeat only one more person to claim it.
He had timed his entry into the Mount Luofu ruins precisely to avoid some of the competition, never expecting he would still fail to pass Tang Xumi.
"Does anyone else wish to fight?" Tang Xumi tilted his head back and drained a jar of golden liquid—a spiritual medicine that quickly restored his exhausted body.
Most importantly, he had never suffered a severe injury, so minor wounds and exhaustion meant little to him.
The disciples aligned with him and his gold-armored guards stepped forward, turning their backs to him to face Li Qingxu, Hu Tingwen, and the others.
"Since senior brothers have no further challenges, let this come to a close!" Tang Xumi declared. Flanked by his entourage, he prepared to leave.
Bang!
A gold-armored guard behind Tang Xumi suddenly struck, landing a palm against him that sent him coughing up blood.
This guard was astonishingly powerful: a terrifying dark light surged from his left hand while brilliant white heavenly light erupted from his right. Not only did he injure Tang Xumi, but he also swept up the Eight Trigrams Furnace with his heavenly light.
Without a moment's hesitation, he hurled it away instantly.
"The world-renowned Yinyang Black-White Force? You're from the Yinyang Daoist Temple! To think I had such a master by my side!" Tang Xumi's face turned completely cold.
The turn of events was so abrupt that it caught everyone off guard.
The heavenly light force cultivated by this expert of the Yinyang Daoist Temple was exceptionally unique and mighty. Black and white light had burst from his hands, wrapping around the Eight Trigrams Furnace and flinging it with immense force—directly toward Li Qingxu!
No one had anticipated this, leaving them powerless to stop it.
A look of delight crossed Li Qingxu's face. He began burning his origin, preparing to flee, and reached out to catch the falling Eight Trigrams Furnace that was about to land in his grasp.
Clang! Clang!
Two metallic chimes rang out almost simultaneously. An iron arrow struck the Eight Trigrams Furnace, sending sparks flying, while a stone struck the furnace body with tremendous force, shattering into fine powder.
These two impacts completely altered the furnace's trajectory.
Li Qingxu was furious. He had been just a hair's breadth away from catching the Eight Trigrams Furnace!
Yet now it veered off course, falling into the hands of an elite disciple, who immediately tossed it back toward Tang Xumi.
Qin Ming lowered his bow. He had been watching the battlefield the entire time, keeping his eyes on Li Qingxu, Tang Xumi, and the others. He possessed the five supreme arts of saber, spear, hammer, bow, and lance, and had just demonstrated one of them.
The stone had come from a graceful gold-armored guard. It was Li Qingyue, who was now walking over from the distance, no longer concealing her true self.
Chapter 120