The Hurricane

*Boom!* The storm descended. Their figures were instantly scattered in disarray by the ferocious winds, the protective spiritual light around their bodies shuddering incessantly. The moment Qin Sang drove his ebony sword through the barrier, he felt chaotic, tyrannical waves of immense force striking him one after another, tossing him about like duckweed in a torrential downpour. Flustered, the group scrambled to stabilize themselves and barely managed to hold their ground within the storm. Qin Sang channeled more true essence into his ebony sword, stimulating protective sword qi around himself. Deep inside the storm, heaven and earth were shrouded in gloom. The gale was almost tangible; streaks of gray wind raged across the expanse between sky and sea, clearly visible to the naked eye. The sea surface was not calm for even a single breath, swept upward by the hurricane into towering, monstrous waves. Their ears could register no other sound. The howling gale and the crashing, reforming waves unleashed a deafening roar that made their very hearts thud violently in resonance. *Crash!* A colossal wave surged toward them at breakneck speed, swelling to its peak right before them—dozens of zhang high—and crashed down viciously in their direction. Their expressions changed slightly. The terrifying might carried by the giant wave set their hearts pounding, and without the slightest hesitation, they flew higher into the air to evade it. "Gather close! Don't break formation!" Xiang Yi transmitted his voice, rallying the group. With Xiang Yi at the center, Qin Sang and the others clustered together, gazing with lingering dread toward the depths of the storm—a murky realm that seemed to stretch on forever without end. Only when confronting such raw celestial might could immortal cultivators truly sense their own insignificance. "Let's go!" Xiang Yi activated the restriction within his jade pendant to pinpoint their direction and led the group into a rapid dash. The wind and waves raged relentlessly, growing ever more dreadful the further they advanced. They veered up and down, left and right, dodging towering swells as they trudged forward with great difficulty through the hurricane. Qin Sang remained distracted throughout, looking all around. Having tempered himself in the Ancient Immortal Battlefield for many years, he was intimately familiar with the celestial anomalies provoked by spirit tides. The more he observed this gale, the more alike it seemed, yet he detected no trace of an actual spirit tide here. Perhaps it was simply because they had not ventured deep enough yet. Then again, with their level of cultivation, harboring hopes of plunging deep into the heart of the storm was nothing short of a pipedream. To withstand the tempest, they had to keep their magic treasures constantly active to protect themselves, resulting in an unceasing drain on their true essence. On the Ancient Immortal Battlefield, whenever a celestial anomaly struck, one could still search for a shelter to take cover and recover their breath. But here lay a boundless ocean where not even an islet was in sight. There was nowhere to set foot and rest; running dry of true essence meant certain death. Even over this modest distance, the rate at which their true essence depleted began to make several of them uneasy. "Fellow Daoist Xiang, how much farther until we reach the Hall of Seven Kills?" Cui Ji had summoned his Purple Nether Pearl, which floated before his chest and radiated a purple protective light. Cast across his bloodless, pale face, it lent him an eerie look. Xiang Yi knitted his brows and glanced at Cui Ji. "With everyone's cultivation here, holding out until the Hall of Seven Kills opens will certainly be no problem. Fellow Daoist Cui, calm yourself." The others could only suppress the unease in their hearts and follow quietly behind Xiang Yi. They had flown an unknown distance. Calculating the time, less than an hour remained until midnight; the Grand Shaman was likely about to begin breaking the formation. The group hastened their pace. Fortunately, they encountered no mishaps along the way and reached the Hall of Seven Kills rather smoothly. "We're here!" Xiang Yi let out a soft cry. Their eyes brightened. Following Xiang Yi's gaze, gasps of astonishment escaped their lips one after another, faces painted with shock. Before them stood a wall of wind composed of gray vapor. Only upon closer inspection did one realize that this wind wall was merely a fraction of the hurricane's outer edge. This gray vapor was hurricane force condensed to the absolute extreme. Gales from all directions seemed to converge toward this single point, coiling and congregating here to form a hurricane resembling a dark storm cloud. They could only glimpse a fragment of it and could not begin to imagine how vast its full expanse was. Beneath the wind wall lay an enormous ocean crater and vortex, like a colossal funnel set into the sea. Around its rim stood water curtains dozens of zhang high where seawater surged backward; an endless torrent of seawater was sucked into the whirlpool, yet the abyss could never be filled. The hurricane and the vortex joined together, merging into a seamless whole. Xiang Yi signaled for them to halt. For upon arriving here, affected by their surroundings, the gale became even more violent. They had to pour everything into channeling their magic treasures just to keep from being blown apart. If they advanced any farther and were swept up by the gale or sucked into the underwater vortex, their fate would surely be dire. The cultivators hovered in midair. Qin Sang recalled that before entering Ziwei Palace, one could still see layers of cloud seas and the Heavenly Gate of Ziwei Palace. Here, there was nothing to see—only an endless expanse of gray hurricane. He wondered whether the Hall of Seven Kills was concealed deep within the gale, or buried in the seabed vortex. Qin Sang withdrew his gaze and looked around, noticing that other cultivators had already arrived in the vicinity. Some were solitary wanderers, while others had traveled in groups just like them. Everyone obediently stood outside, waiting for the Hall of Seven Kills to open. Qin Sang looked all around, scrutinizing the hurricane and the vortex, yet found no sign of the Witch Clan's Grand Shaman or those Nascent Soul Patriarchs who had arrived earlier. The position where they stood was merely one side of the hurricane. According to Xiang Yi, the hurricane and vortex were roughly circular; cultivators holding tokens simply needed to wait at the edge like them until the signal that the immortal formation was breached. *The gale here is simply too terrifying. Only the immortal formations of legend could produce such a frightening anomaly, and it shows no sign of waning. Aside from the absence of spatial rifts, it feels barely any different from the eye of the storm outside Ziwei Palace. I wonder if the interior is just as perilous and horrific as Ziwei Palace's immortal formation. Back then, the Lesser Cold Domain only dared to venture inside by relying on the Lesser Beichen Star Element Formation, and even then, only when Ziwei Palace emerged on its own... Just how does the Witch Clan's Grand Shaman intend to forcibly break the formation?* Qin Sang was inclined to wander around to see if he could locate the Grand Shaman and watch him break the formation with his own eyes. Seeing that Xiang Yi had no such intention, however, he could only abandon the thought. Before long, Xiang Yi cleared up his doubts: "Right now, the Grand Shaman and those Nascent Soul Patriarchs have already ventured into the storm's depths to engage the immortal formation. No matter where we stand, it's impossible to witness the formation being broken. We must stay put and wait for the signal to appear. The window to enter the formation is fleeting, so remember not to be distracted, lest you ruin what matters..." Before his words had fully faded, the group suddenly sensed a tyrannical aura flying toward them at astonishing speed. Before anyone could react, it swept past them in the blink of an eye and appeared directly before the wind wall, revealing a gray-robed elder. "Yunlai Sanren," the Liu couple recognized the elder's identity and said softly. "He is a renowned rogue cultivator in the Inner Sea with deep connections in both the righteous and demonic factions, ruling over an island of his own. The two of us once had the fortune of meeting him." Without question, Yunlai Sanren was a Nascent Soul Patriarch. The elder paused briefly before the wind wall, drew out an iron brush forged from dark iron, and lightly traced a stroke against the wall. A streak of black light materialized in the void. Appearing completely effortless, a tear was sliced open in the wind wall. The elder's figure vanished from the spot, and only then did the tear slowly seal shut.