An Immortal's Secret Art!

"Stop! Don't let her get away!" "Die!" "Kill her!" A mob of demon Body Integration stage experts clamored behind them, their bloodlines pushed to the absolute limit. All manner of innate divine abilities rained down, crashing into empty air. The ground rumbled, swaths of forest collapsed, and dust billowed skyward. Whoosh— Third Senior Sister skillfully piloted the beast hide, darting out from the dust and leaving them far behind in her wake. She did not forget to reassure Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou: "Don't be afraid, Junior Brothers. I learned flight techniques from the Fifth Elder. While I'm not quite as adept as the venerable elder, shaking off this lot is more than easy." Third Senior Sister had deliberately erected a barrier over the beast hide to block the rushing wind, but such extreme speed was still more than Golden Core cultivators could bear. Moreover, her flight path was truly not something ordinary people could stomach. To put it nicely, she fluttered like a butterfly; to put it harshly, she spun like a violent tornado—spinning even more furiously than when Lu Yang, Meng Jingzhou, and Man Gu had performed their three-man combination. Fortunately, the two had previous experience drag-racing in the Fifth Elder's flying shuttle, so this time they did not pass out right away. Along the way, Third Senior Sister continually launched attacks behind her, mixing real strikes with feints. Worn out from dodging and parrying, the pursuing Body Integration experts finally gave up the chase. "I told them they couldn't catch me, yet they insisted on trying. What a waste of time," Third Senior Sister grumbled as she made a temporary landing; she had established a stronghold nearby. "Are you two all right?" After landing, Third Senior Sister sensed her two junior brothers swaying on their feet, unable to stand steady. "No... no... Never mind, I'm not all right." The two wanted to act tough and claim they were fine, but their bodies were brutally honest. They collapsed, unconscious. Third Senior Sister shook her head helplessly. Controlling the beast hide, she rolled the two of them up and brought them along into the stronghold. Hearing the sparse patter of rain outside, Lu Yang struggled to open his eyes. His head felt like a bowl of mush, and for a moment he could not recall what had happened before blacking out. He stared blankly at the cave ceiling until a drop of water condensed overhead and splashed onto his face. Only then did he reluctantly turn his head, gradually piecing together what had occurred. Lu Yang turned and saw a pair of legs... Meng Jingzhou's. Looking past Meng Jingzhou, he saw a crackling campfire and Third Senior Sister sitting beside it. In the dim cave, firelight danced, stretching and shrinking Third Senior Sister's shadow while shifting the play of light and shade across her face, lending her an exceptional beauty. Third Senior Sister stroked her zither and hummed softly. Her melody was gentle and mellifluous, putting the listener at ease—as though soaking in warm water, gently buoyed by an invisible force. "You're awake? It seems your physical constitutions are even better than I estimated." Third Senior Sister smoothed down the zither strings, a smile curling on her lips. This was an original zither piece of hers that calmed the spirit and settled the soul. Their early awakening also had to do with wearing the remains of Immortal Suiyue given by Sister Shangguan. "Both of us?" Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou woke up almost simultaneously. Lu Yang had been facing Meng Jingzhou's feet, and Meng Jingzhou was naturally facing Lu Yang's. The two jerked upright, but the aftereffects of the wild ride lingered; a wave of dizziness struck, and they nearly tumbled back to the ground. "Don't rush. Take a moment to catch your breath." "Where is this?" "A stronghold I established a century ago. It seems our luck held out; no one has discovered it in all these years, so it's quite safe." "Those old monsters won't give up easily. They'll probably scour the surrounding area for a few days before leaving, so the three of us can rest and recuperate here for a bit." "We left in a hurry earlier. Now that we have some time, we might as well take inventory of the treasures we scavenged from the secret realm." Hearing this, Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou accessed their identity jade tokens and dumped out a mountain of heavenly treasures. Lu Yang casually picked up the fruit-shaped Wood Platinum Jade, munching on it while sorting through the rest of the hoard. As he consumed it, the effects of the Wood Platinum Jade merged into his body, enhancing his sword qi and vitality. With his vitality surging, the dizziness gradually faded. "We split these spirit stones half-and-half." Lu Yang divided the pile of spirit stones into two equal halves with his hands. "Take these manuals." Meng Jingzhou handed Lu Yang a thick stack of cultivation manuals. Lu Yang glanced at them: dual cultivation techniques. "What would I want these for?" "And what, you think I have any use for them?" Lu Yang thought about it and felt Meng Jingzhou had a point. He took the manuals and casually flipped through a few, an expression of disgust crossing his face. Orthodox dual cultivation techniques balanced and replenished yin and yang, whereas the ones the Suanni kept were all unorthodox methods of plucking yin to supplement yang, causing endless harm. "Burn them." Lu Yang casually tossed the manuals into the campfire, and they were soon reduced to a pile of ashes. "Hm? There's something inside?" Words from the manuals drifted up from the flames and converged into a single sheet of golden paper, remaining completely unharmed by the blazing fire. Lu Yang looked surprised. It seemed this was the true technique hidden within the manuals, revealed only through fire. "Standing anew after destruction... could it be a coincidence?" Lu Yang muttered, reaching straight into the flames to pull out the golden sheet. Dense rows of tiny characters covered the paper; it truly was a cultivation technique. "This is..." "What is it?" "An Immortal's secret art!" "What?!" Not just Meng Jingzhou, but even Third Senior Sister, who had been sitting quietly, was astonished. Neither of them expected such an earth-shattering secret art to be concealed inside dual cultivation manuals. This yang-strengthening technique was written in the ancient language, which only Lu Yang could fully understand. "What kind of technique is it?" "A yang-strengthening technique." Meng Jingzhou: "..." Are you messing with me, kid? "Wait, what does an Immortal need a yang-strengthening technique for? Which Immortal could possibly need to boost their yang?" Meng Jingzhou suddenly realized something, recalling an ancient rumor: "Could it be Immortal Ying Tian? I heard Immortal Ying Tian bedded a hundred women a night, had a taste for married women, and got countless women pregnant in a single night!" Lu Yang stared at Meng Jingzhou in disbelief. Where on earth did this rumor come from? Weren't people afraid Immortal Ying Tian would strike the rumormonger dead with lightning during tribulation transcendence? Even after an Immortal died, their Dao fruit would not vanish; the Immortal Fairy was prime proof of that. Lu Yang had no way of telling whether Immortal Ying Tian was still alive based purely on the continued existence of heavenly tribulations. "It was meant for Immortal Kirin. He had two wives," Lu Yang revealed, naming the true user of this technique. "Immortal Kirin?" "The one people often call the Demon Celestial. His true form was a kirin—the only kirin in this world. He had two wives, one from the Dragon Clan and one from the Phoenix Clan." "This yang-strengthening technique was researched and created by the Demon Celestial's two wives." Third Senior Sister wore an expression of surprise. In scholarly circles, there was indeed a theory speculating that the Demon Celestial's true form was a kirin, but with no solid evidence, no one could say for sure. Ever since its inception, the theory had been met with skepticism. Yet judging from her junior brother's tone, he was utterly convinced. Could he possess definitive proof? As for the Demon Celestial having two wives, in all her years studying ancient history, she had never heard the slightest mention of it. Back in the ancient era, the Dragon and Phoenix Clans indeed had two peerless titans who had reached the half-immortal realm. Was her junior brother saying those two were the Demon Celestial's wives? No wonder Eldest Senior Sister had dispatched this junior brother here. Although his cultivation was not high, his knowledge of ancient history ran remarkably deep.