Yet the spiritual energy leaving his body was like water meeting a dam, entirely blocked outside the stone statue.
As if the statue were an insulator against spiritual energy and divine sense, all of Li Fan's conventional methods proved useless in examining it.
"Intriguing. I wonder what kind of material this really is."
Li Fan conjured another water blade and directed it to slash swiftly at the stone statue.
Let alone ordinary stone, even refined steel would have been cleaved in two by such a blade.
Yet the water blade could not harm the damaged statue in the slightest.
The instant it made contact, the spiritual energy sustaining the blade's power scattered and dissipated.
Aside from giving the stone statue a good wash, it inflicted no damage whatsoever.
"What a fine treasure! A pity there is so little of it, and it cannot be brought back to reality.
"Otherwise, it could have been used to build an absolutely secure secret chamber."
Li Fan imagined the many wondrous uses of this unknown stone, feeling a touch of regret.
A thought struck him. Picking up a stone from the ground nearby, he used it as a tool to forcefully chip another fragment off the statue.
Then, he drove the stone shard hard into his own arm.
Blood flowed instantly.
Li Fan frowned slightly.
When spiritual energy circulated to the wound caused by the shard, it could not flow freely. It had to detour around it, drastically reducing efficiency.
Furthermore, with the shard lodged inside his flesh, the injury could not be healed using spiritual energy unless it was removed.
After falling into deep thought for a moment, Li Fan endured the pain and dug the shard out, rolling it between his fingers.
*Perhaps I can defeat Senior Brother Zhang by means other than grinding him down,* he pondered silently.
While Li Fan was studying the miraculous statue, the battle in the sky had reached a white-hot intensity.
Song Hesong had revealed his true colors, joining Chu Liang and the others to besiege Zhang Qianmo.
The destructive force of the aftershocks from their clash reduced Ningyuan City below to utter ruin.
Countless houses collapsed, and who knew how many mortals perished in ignorance.
Meanwhile, at the small temple, with Li Fan stepping in to ward off the fallout, not the slightest danger occurred.
*Even without me, with this battered stone statue here, those children would probably have been just fine.*
*No wonder they were able to come out full of vitality to organize rescue efforts after the great battle last time,* Li Fan thought to himself.
The battle continued according to its predetermined script.
Falling into a disadvantage, Song Hesong slammed both palms violently toward Ningyuan City.
In an instant, mortal casualties were beyond count.
Their blood surged skyward as malevolent energy, forming the All Living Beings Spirit-Refining Array to bind Zhang Qianmo.
Pressing his advantage relentlessly, Song Hesong unleashed several more palm strikes in succession.
With a Golden Core cultivator striking, each palm claimed tens of thousands of mortal lives.
One of the palms happened to come crashing directly toward the small temple.
Li Fan's eyes flickered slightly. Lowering his defensive barrier, he darted behind the remaining portion of the stone statue.
When the palm force struck the statue, it produced no effect whatsoever and simply vanished into nothingness.
Yet everywhere beyond the statue's obstruction was reduced to rubble.
It was as though a vacuum devoid of spiritual energy had appeared, without drawing the slightest notice from Song Hesong.
Li Fan stood up from behind the statue, casually swept aside the surrounding debris, and continued watching the battle in the sky.
Once Zhang Qianmo broke through his limits to be reborn, entered his purple core state, and slaughtered his enemies in all directions, Li Fan gave it some thought, pushed the stone statue aside, and entered the underground secret chamber.
Seeing someone enter, the children inside tensed at first.
When they saw clearly that it was Li Fan, the "good man," they let out sighs of relief.
"Better to hide inside. It's truly terrifying out there," Li Fan said, shaking his head with a sigh.
Lu Ya grinned without saying much, simply waving Li Fan over to sit down.
The underground chamber was not large, but it was spacious enough to shelter everyone.
It was stocked with water and rations, clearly having served often as a place of refuge.
Seizing this opportunity, Li Fan began chatting with the yellow-haired Lu Ya.
He learned that this temple had originally been called the "Xuantian Temple."
The underground chamber had already existed when they stumbled upon it by chance.
As for who was enshrined here, no one knew, for it had been abandoned for many years.
Regarding where the missing upper half of the statue had gone, Lu Ya was even more clueless.
Just then, a little girl nearby chimed in, "I know, I know! It's at Mr. Bai's house! When Mr. Bai took me back to treat my illness last time, I saw it.
"Half a torso standing right there, without a face at all—it was so scary!"
Lu Ya froze. "You know where Mr. Bai lives? Then why did you say you didn't know when I asked you last time?"
The little girl flushed and glared at Lu Ya. "I went there, but I was sick and dazed! Who would remember the way!"
*Mr. Bai...*
Taking in the two children's conversation, Li Fan grew thoughtful.
***
High above Ningyuan City, having slain all the scoundrels, Zhang Qianmo hurriedly searched for the junior brother who had warned him.
Yet even after scouring Ningyuan City back and forth several times with his divine sense, he failed to find him.
Believing his junior brother had met with misfortune, Zhang Qianmo felt immense remorse.
Refusing to give up, he searched several more times, hoping at least to find his junior brother's remains.
Still, it yielded nothing.
In the end, Zhang Qianmo could only claim the Longevity Fruit alone and depart Ningyuan City filled with grief.
Not long after he sped away into the distance, a petite figure poked its head out cautiously from the ruins of the small temple.
After observing vigilantly for a long time, the figure finally called out boldly with relief, "It's safe, come on out!"
Immediately after, Li Fan followed the cluster of little ones as they emerged from the underground chamber.
Looking at Ningyuan City, now reduced to rubble and strewn with corpses, the children could not help but feel bewildered.
Yet as orphans who survived on their own, their psychological resilience was exceptionally strong.
Li Fan saw neither terror nor fear in their eyes.
They were merely at a loss for the moment, unsure of what to do.
*This Mr. Bai should be arriving soon.*
Since there were no other cultivators left in the city besides himself, Li Fan no longer had any reservations.
He immediately extended his divine sense among the survivors to search for traces of Mr. Bai.
According to the children's description, he should be easy to spot:
A young, gentle, and exceptionally handsome frail scholar.
However...
Li Fan's expression shifted slightly.
He found no one matching that description.
Li Fan searched several more times, but the result remained the same.
*Could it be that 'exceptionally handsome' was merely the children's own idealization?*
Li Fan could not help but speculate.
With no other choice, he could only wait at the small temple for Mr. Bai to arrive.
Yet to Li Fan's surprise, he still had not seen this Mr. Bai even as the duration of this Fallen Immortal Realm session drew to a close.
The scenery around him began to blur. Just as Li Fan was about to leave the Fallen Immortal Realm, he faintly heard the children's ecstatic cries:
"Xiao Bai! Xiao Bai is here!"
"Mr. Bai! Mr. Bai!"
Li Fan whipped his head around, but only caught a vague glimpse of a blurred silhouette.
Chapter 275