Earlier, Lady Yue had been trying to stop Qin Sang.
Now, however, she seemed to hate Old Man Yanshan to the bone. Her bewitching eyes practically spewed fire as she hurled magic treasures and Daoist arts at him with reckless abandon.
As the beloved concubine of Old Demon Lu's adoptive son, Lady Yue was naturally not lacking in magic treasures.
Losing her light veil treasure at the onset of battle barely affected her. Following the thunder bead and silver bracelet, in the blink of an eye she produced a crystal saber with a beaded tassel from her mustard seed pouch.
Old Man Yanshan was strained to his limits, scrambling to fend her off.
Qin Sang withdrew his gaze and continued unraveling the formation.
Having already mapped out the internal structure and meridians of the spirit formation, the subsequent steps would proceed much more smoothly.
The Snow-Treading Divine Saber darted about with increasing speed. One talismanic rune after another—sprawling like ghostly scrawls—was embedded into the spirit formation by Qin Sang until the formation was altered beyond recognition.
"That's enough..."
Qin Sang was now more than seventy percent confident.
With Luye nearby, escaping as quickly as possible was paramount.
Wasting no more time, Qin Sang hooked his fingers slightly. The Snow-Treading Divine Saber flew back into his hand, a thread of saber qi trailing from the blade's tip, remaining connected to the spirit formation.
*Clang!*
Upon entering his grasp, the divine saber reverted to its normal size.
Qin Sang vaulted into the air. Looking down from above, his true essence surged wildly within him as he drove the Snow-Treading Divine Saber in a diagonal sweep through the void.
It appeared to be a gentle strike, its saber glow hardly blinding.
The feather-light saber qi drifted down like a delicate plume, seemingly sluggish yet swift in reality, landing upon the formation's surface without a trace of worldly clamor.
At the same time, the sword qi Qin Sang had left inside the formation plate erupted in tandem, echoing the strike.
*Puff!*
Like boiling water poured over snow.
The Snow-Treading Divine Saber effortlessly etched a gash nearly a hundred zhang long into the ice sheet, shaving past the ice pillar to slice straight into the very core of the spirit formation.
This slash severed the intricate energy flow of the spirit formation with supreme precision, breaking it with minimal effort—truly flawless, subtle to the utmost peak!
Only with the aid of the Heavenly Eye Butterfly could Qin Sang achieve such perfection.
Old Man Yanshan couldn't help but shout, "Well done!"
"Done!"
Qin Sang let out a sigh of relief.
Though it looked effortless, it had demanded an immense toll on his mental focus.
With that single cut,
the spirit formation remained the same formation on the outside, but its inner nature was fundamentally altered.
The runes on the formation plate dimmed one by one at an accelerating pace. In the blink of an eye, more than half of the formation plate had turned dull and murky, its power bleeding away rapidly.
Seeing the formation unravel, Lady Yue's expression tightened with urgency. Driving the crystal saber to entangle Old Man Yanshan's cord, she bit the tip of her tongue and spat a cloud of blood mist into the silver bracelet.
The silver bracelet turned blood-red in an instant. Sated with blood, it emanated an eerie, sinister radiance—clearly an evil implement.
With a buzz, the silver bracelet split in two, opening and snapping shut as it lunged to clamp onto Old Man Yanshan.
The whistling wind snatched Old Man Yanshan's attention back.
Recognizing the bracelet's formidable power, he dared not be careless. His fingers blurred like spinning wheels as he wove an exceptionally complex hand seal.
The Dragon Head Shield was still holding off the thunder bead.
The thunder bead had been blasting wild bolts of lightning without pause.
Yet the material of the Dragon Head Shield was no ordinary substance; the lightning's corrosive properties were ineffective against it, capable only of piercing the water barrier without harming the shield itself.
The shield shuddered violently, rippling out a visible shockwave that surged like a crashing wave toward the thunder bead with thunderous rapidity.
With this single move, the tides of offense and defense reversed.
The wave forcibly obliterated the pink lightning and crashed right into the thunder bead.
A tremendous force immediately sent the thunder bead flying skyward.
Old Man Yanshan instantly recalled the Dragon Head Shield, intending to repeat the maneuver to block the silver bracelet.
Unexpectedly, this played right into Lady Yue's hands.
The silver bracelet had been targeting the Dragon Head Shield all along. The two halves twisted and warped into pliable forms resembling bloodworms. Rather than retreating before the incoming shield, they surged forward, wrapping around it from left and right and biting each other's tails.
In a breath, the Dragon Head Shield was firmly clamped within a blood ring.
Old Man Yanshan faltered slightly. He urgently drove the Dragon Head Shield, causing it to vibrate wildly with an intense hum, but the blood ring was exceptionally resilient and could not be broken in short order.
At the same time, sensing something amiss with Lady Yue and recalling her earlier trick, Old Man Yanshan plunged downward and forcefully tapped the ice sheet beneath his feet with his toe.
A silver sheen lit up the ice as though dusted with silver powder—it was the very drop of water Old Man Yanshan had scattered earlier, which he had never recalled.
This was a spiritual water he had refined over many years; borrowing the name of the Heavenly River's waters from celestial legends, he brazenly called it One-Origin Heavy Water.
The true One-Origin Heavy Water was the stuff of legends, and this spiritual water naturally could not compare. Nevertheless, it possessed the trait of weighing thousands of jin, dispersed and coalesced at his whim, and held infinite utility.
The silver powder gathered swiftly beneath Old Man Yanshan's toe and seeped into the ice.
From a distance, one could see a vertical layer of silver foil abruptly materialize within the ice sheet.
*Bang!*
The ice cavern shook as the clang of clashing metal rang out.
A figure was jolted out of the ice—Lady Yue, who had attempted to repeat her earlier feat by tunneling through the ice to seize the cold crystal. Unfortunately, her path had been blocked by the One-Origin Heavy Water, her divine ability seen through by Old Man Yanshan.
Old Man Yanshan had just breathed a sigh of relief when—
*Boom!*
Ice fragments splattered in all directions.
Rather than continuing to force her way forward underground, Lady Yue burst clean out of the ice, transforming herself into a living blade and charging toward Old Man Yanshan with desperate, life-risking ferocity.
By now, Qin Sang had already flashed beside the ice pillar. Just as he reached out to snatch the cold crystal, his gaze suddenly froze.
Inside the ice pillar, a bizarre blue glow was silently brewing. Not only within the pillar, but throughout the entire cavern—above, below, left, and right—points of blue light emerged, glittering like a sea of stars.
A formation within a formation!
Qin Sang's face fell drastically as he shouted, "Watch out!"
...
While the battle raged within the ice cavern,
Qin Sang's true body had entered the snow plain, gone underground, and located the source of the anomaly.
What greeted his eyes was a massive, roaring ice storm.
Looking down from above, a vortex spiraled at the ice storm's center, where bone-chilling winds swept chunks of ice in a rapid gyre.
Where the spiral led below remained unknown, but Qin Sang could sense that his incarnation and the Heavenly Eye Butterfly were inside.
Both the reach and the fury of the ice storm had far surpassed when it first erupted.
Pausing briefly, Qin Sang conjured true essence to shield himself and darted into the tempest.
*Whoosh! Bang! Bang! Bang...*
The howling of the wind.
The impacts of ice blocks slamming against his protective true essence.
Chaos reigned around Qin Sang, reducing his visibility to almost nothing.
His spiritual sense was similarly restricted.
He recognized this as the power of a spirit formation, yet he felt no barrier or boundary of that sort.
After diving deeper for a distance, Qin Sang realized that the greatest factor impairing his spiritual sense and obscuring the connection between him and his incarnation was the turbulent cold evil energy permeating the area.
*A spirit formation of this caliber poses no threat to my incarnation...*
Qin Sang thought, though he remained on guard.
As he delved deeper, the connection between him, his incarnation, and the Heavenly Eye Butterfly grew clearer. Unfortunately, with the relentless barrage of ice spheres and dense cold evil energy, it had not yet reached the point where they could perceive each other's thoughts.
Before long, Qin Sang suddenly sensed an anomaly behind him.
Shortly after Qin Sang had plunged into the ice storm, Old Wu—dispatched under orders—had arrived, similarly drawn by the tempest's disturbances.
Unable to find Lady Yue outside and figuring she was likely within, he had charged in as well.
Qin Sang and Old Wu moved one after the other.
Both had come to offer support, and with both intent on taking enemies by surprise, they had coincidentally suppressed their auras, missing each other's presence outside completely.
However, once inside the storm, having to withstand the onslaught of cold evil energy made continued concealment impossible.
Just as Qin Sang detected Old Wu, Old Wu also sensed someone ahead!
*Someone's coming from behind!*
The moment this thought flickered through Qin Sang's mind, a fierce alarm flared in his heart. His expression darkened as he whipped around. The Qianjun Ring flashed, flicking out a sword arc fast as lightning.
*Clang!* A crisp ring echoed.
The Jinchen Sword stood before Qin Sang, colliding with a black iron hook.
Old Wu had come under orders to aid Lady Yue, concerned for her safety.
He knew for certain that anyone he encountered here who was not Lady Yue was an enemy to be killed on sight, so he had launched a sneak attack without hesitation.
The iron hook was called the Bone-Dissolving Hook. Extremely insidious and eerily unpredictable, countless cultivators had perished beneath it.
To Old Wu's surprise, the Bone-Dissolving Hook was easily blocked by his opponent.
Sword and hook clashed.
Qin Sang felt the blood and qi within his body roil, stirred by the Bone-Dissolving Hook. Had he not also cultivated the *Heavenly Demon Refining Form*, possessing a physique comparable to a demon king's, he would have suffered a grievous setback on the spot.
Without hesitating or pausing to settle his boiling blood and qi, he followed the path of the hook's assault to locate the ambusher and unleashed a blast of heavenly thunder in retaliation!
A thunderclap roared.
The Thunder Command Art was unleashed.
A bolt of lightning manifested out of nowhere amidst the storm, dazzling and world-shaking in its fury.
Old Wu felt a sharp prick at the crown of his head, the hairs all over his body standing on end. Tilting his head back, he let out a piercing howl and spat a burst of blood light from his mouth—revealing a thumbnail-sized piece of blood jade.
*Boom!*
At the critical juncture, the blood jade successfully intercepted the lightning, its crimson glow dimming instantly as it was knocked downward.
Old Wu darted aside and hastily retrieved the blood jade. Seeing its spiritual light so lackluster, he had no time to mourn it, his heart still pounding with lingering terror as he deeply regretted underestimating his foe.
Qin Sang sighed internally as well.
The Thunder Command Art could be cast instantaneously at will, making it unmatched for countering ambushes or swiftly dispatching foes.
Unfortunately, as his realm advanced and his true essence deepened, the proportion of true essence that the Thunder Command Art could mobilize grew smaller and smaller. Its power failed to scale in kind and was gradually becoming mediocre.
Nowadays, though the Thunder Command Art could still be considered a top-tier divine ability, it could no longer produce the heaven-defying feat of allowing a Golden Core cultivator to contend with a Nascent Soul expert as it once had.
"Late Nascent Soul!"
Seeing their opponent clearly, Qin Sang and Old Wu both felt a jolt of solemnity.
To run into a grand cultivator in such a desolate backwater left Qin Sang even more perplexed, though he was thankful his true body had followed along, avoiding another disaster.
On second thought, it made sense.
At his level, only treasures exceedingly rare in the mortal world could catch his eye, and anyone qualified to contest them was bound to be an expert of comparable cultivation.
The ordeal his incarnation had encountered was likely no accident!
Qin Sang's thoughts raced.
Old Wu looked Qin Sang up and down, barking coldly, "Who are you?! Did you kill Lady Yue?"
Although Lady Yue possessed protective treasures gifted by the young master, she had always been kept like a caged canary in Luye. Her horizons were narrow, and on ordinary days only a few Nether Moon Guards sparred with her—careful never to harm her, pulling their punches at every turn.
Faced with a grand cultivator, Old Wu didn't fancy her chances of escaping with her life.
"What Lady Yue?"
Qin Sang narrowed his eyes. Hearing this, he knew something had indeed gone awry below, and he swung his sword to strike!
*Whew!*
The Jinchen Sword stabbed straight at Old Wu's face, almost like another bolt of heavenly thunder.
Prepared this time, Old Wu manipulated the Bone-Dissolving Hook to conjure several hook phantoms, their tips aimed at the Jinchen Sword's blade to ensnare it.
Yet as the Jinchen Sword closed in, Old Wu noticed something peculiar in the sword glow, and a sharp premonition of danger surged within him.
Though unsure of the reason, Old Wu unhesitatingly recalled the Bone-Dissolving Hook and slapped his dantian. A streak of radiant light shot forth, and an object flew out, swelling upon meeting the wind—revealing a short dagger-axe.
This treasure was called the Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe, Old Wu's lifebound magic treasure.
Even he had not expected that right at the start of the battle, he would be forced to deploy the Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe—and forced to use it defensively, no less.
At the same time, the Jinchen Sword streaked forward, its sword glow blurring before vanishing abruptly.
Immediately afterward, the surrounding ice storm ground to a halt.
The white ice spheres seemed veiled in a layer of grey gauze, like an invisible curtain expanding at astonishing speed.
The Seven Po Killing Array!
Qin Sang opened with a lethal technique right away.
Having broken through to the late Nascent Soul stage, the sword array's might was naturally on an entirely different level compared to the past.
Unable to dodge in time, Old Wu saw his vision abruptly darken. Countless sword threads formed out of thin air around him—a sword technique unlike anything he had ever seen. Pricked by the sword qi, his nascent soul faintly ached, creating the phantom sensation of sword qi piercing his internal organs. A chill gripped his heart.
The sword threads quivered and converged to strangle him.
"Heaven-Fixing Divine Dagger-Axe!"
Old Wu retreated at speed, shouting under his breath.
As though a seal had been peeled away from the Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe, its edges suddenly blazed a glaring crimson. Droplets of blood seemed to swim along the blade, releasing a pungent stench of gore.
*Whoosh!*
Old Wu barely seemed to move.
The Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe vanished.
This was not true disappearance, but the effect of speed pushed to the utmost extreme.
In an instant, the Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe slashed an uncounted number of times. Tens of thousands of weapon silhouettes manifested across the void, densely packed. Wherever the silhouettes touched, the void seemed to solidify—truly living up to the name "Heaven-Fixing"!
The sword array and dagger-axe silhouettes collided, an unbroken string of deafening roars ringing out.
Sword threads and dagger-axe images cancelled each other out, both disintegrating into nothingness.
Old Wu seized the opening to disengage.
This exchange had ended in a dead heat.
"A pseudo-spirit treasure!"
Qin Sang's eyes narrowed slightly as he stared intently at the Blood-Drinking Demonic Dagger-Axe.
Judging by its power, it fell short of Yin Changsheng's Suspended Sword Tower, though it likely had other abilities that had yet to be brought to bear.
Then again, who knew how many years Yin Changsheng had spent refining the Suspended Sword Tower with the *Essence Sacrificing Art*; beneath the Deity Transformation stage, few in the world could temper their lifebound magic treasure to such heights.
Concerned for his incarnation, Qin Sang was unwilling to tangle here any longer, plunging downward at full speed.
Still reeling from the Seven Po Killing Array, Old Wu was startled to see Qin Sang's trajectory. Realizing what was happening, he drove his dagger-axe in pursuit and bellowed, "This is Luye's secret cache! How dare you act with such insolence?! Retreat at once, and your life shall be spared!"
Hearing the word "Luye," Qin Sang's expression grew even graver.
Carrying a pseudo-spirit treasure, this man clearly had a prominent background. Could he truly be a successor of Old Demon Lu?
This was the second time someone had threatened him since his arrival in Zhongzhou.
*Do successors of Deity Transformation cultivators all act so domineeringly?*
Qin Sang scoffed internally. He certainly wouldn't be frightened off by a mere threat; regardless of what lay ahead, reuniting with his incarnation was the top priority.
The two chased and fled in close pursuit.
Clashing as they went, Qin Sang drew close to the ice cavern. His connection with his incarnation grew clearer and clearer, until finally they could vaguely perceive each other's thoughts.
*"It's Luye! Stop him!"*
The true body finally understood the situation. Below, it was a two-on-one fight, with everything well under control; he only needed to hold off this old bastard to keep him from meddling.
The true body stopped abruptly, retrieved his sword, and stood his ground. Sweeping his sleeves, black light flashed between his brows as the fire lotus seed shot forth.
Demonic fire surged to heaven!
Chapter 1573