Translator: Cinder Translations
A sharp, whistling sound pierced the air.
Just as Song Wen was about to devour Xing Li Ren's soul and blood essence, he didn't have time to investigate where the attack had come from.
In a hurry, he swiftly dodged to the left, leaping several meters away.
In the critical moment, he didn't forget to sever one of Xing Li Ren's arms, which held a storage ring.
At the same time, a surge of corpse aura erupted from Song Wen, coalescing into an egg-shaped black shield that enveloped his body.
Only then did Song Wen focus on examining the artifact that had ambushed him.
The artifact was conical, about a foot long, and appeared unremarkable at first glance.
It was a specialized weapon designed for surprise attacks, concealing its killing intent within its form.
The enemy's attack had missed, but they didn't give up.
The conical artifact spun through the air and swiftly pursued Song Wen.
It struck against the black shield.
In an instant, the tip of the cone emitted a dark, cold light, sharp and menacing.
The black shield shattered under the intense pressure of the cone's tip, dissolving into the surrounding corpse aura.
Yet the conical artifact didn't lose momentum, continuing forward until it crashed into a large green bell.
The bell rang with a deep sound!
The bell shattered like glass, breaking into pieces that scattered through the air, releasing a heavy, blood mist.
The conical artifact pierced through the blood mist!
The wind from the artifact blew the mist apart, and Song Wen's figure disappeared without a trace.
"Well, this is an unexpected turn of events. I didn't expect to encounter this person again."
A voice whispered softly through the blood mist—Xing Yixuan's figure emerged.
She had been secretly trailing behind Xing Li Ren, careful not to get too close to avoid detection. Still, she had watched most of the battle between Song Wen and Xing Li Ren.
Her original plan was for Xing Li Ren to defeat Song Wen and, when his guard was down, she would launch a sneak attack to capture him and force him to hand over the Heavenly Spirit Pill.
However, to her surprise, Xing Li Ren had been unable to withstand Song Wen's attack and had perished at his hands.
This turn of events delighted Xing Yixuan.
Xing Li Ren's death had nothing to do with her, and she could now use the excuse of avenging his death to kill Song Wen and claim the Heavenly Spirit Pill.
But her surprise attack had failed; Song Wen was quick to react and narrowly avoided her lethal strike.
"Ugh! What a waste. To die at the hands of an early-stage Golden Core cultivator."
Xing Yixuan approached Xing Li Ren's lifeless body and spat disdainfully.
Then she turned and walked away, showing no intention of recovering the corpse or destroying the evidence.
It was better not to make a scene!
She passed by a pile of shattered, decayed flesh.
The broken flesh was covered in a thick layer of ice crystals, the remnants of Song Wen's puppet, which had been struck by the ice spear and left in ruins.
Xing Yixuan furrowed her brow.
"This seems like the rumored technique of a death-substitute puppet! Who exactly is this person, to master so many rare and profound secret arts?"
She called the conical artifact back, observing a trace of blood on it. A cold smile appeared on her lips.
"Looks like you didn't fully evade the Bone Erosion Cone! This time, you won't escape."
Xing Yixuan's fingers trembled slightly as a thread of magical power shot out, precisely wrapping around the bloodstain.
The bloodstain, guided by the magical power, solidified into a blood bead, floating in the air before her.
Her hands began to form a series of complex gestures.
As the spell was channeled, the blood bead gradually twisted and deformed, eventually transforming into a blood-colored rune.
"Luckily, this person's evasion technique isn't able to escape too far. Otherwise, the blood curse tracking technique might not have succeeded," Xing Yixuan muttered to herself.
Performing a blood-related secret art, Xing Yixuan seemed to be quite exhausted. After briefly regulating her breathing, she lightly sighed.
The blood-colored rune suddenly sped up, flying deep into the ghostly mist.
Xing Yixuan became a shadow, closely following the rune.
Song Wen fell out of the blood mist, his left waist torn with a gash, blood flowing profusely, a shocking sight.
Fortunately, it was only an external injury and wasn't life-threatening.
He circulated his magical energy to temporarily seal the wound and stop the bleeding.
Song Wen took out a healing pill and swallowed it without hesitation, not even taking time to circulate his energy to refine it, instead releasing his spiritual sense to scan his surroundings.
Once he confirmed it was safe, he used his body technique and shot toward a nearby high mountain.
Song Wen knew very little about this secret realm and was cautious about encountering unknown dangers.
For this reason, when he used the Blood Escape Technique, he didn't go all out and only escaped around thirty meters, staying within the mountain's base range.
Xing Yixuan could catch up at any moment.
This place was not safe for prolonged stays!
Song Wen had already devised a plan in his mind.
The higher he went, the denser the ghostly mist became.
He intended to use the Corpse King Reincarnation Technique to resist the ghostly mist and climb along the mountain to escape Xing Yixuan.
This high mountain had no signs of life. It was barren, with exposed rock and no trace of vegetation.
Song Wen kept close to the mountain, flying cautiously, and soon had climbed over thirty meters.
The concentration of the ghostly mist here was ten times denser than at the mountain base, almost as thick as the outer areas of the Ghost Domain. Song Wen's spiritual sense could only reach about ten meters.
He figured that Xing Yixuan likely wouldn't venture this far.
He slowed down his escape and began to search the area for a suitable place to heal.
After climbing for several more meters, suddenly, a platform appeared in front of Song Wen.
Due to the mist, visibility was poor, and with his spiritual sense limited, he couldn't tell what lay ahead of the platform.
Song Wen landed on the platform, cautiously stepping forward.
After walking for a few hundred meters, a towering cave appeared before him.
The entrance was several meters high, faintly visible through the ghostly mist, resembling the gaping maw of a fierce beast, evoking a sense of dread.
Song Wen stared at the dark cave entrance, hesitating for a moment.
He wasn't sure whether to enter or not.
He had climbed from the base to here, and along the way, he found that the mountain was exceptionally smooth, with no cracks or caves to hide in.
The cave before him had obvious signs of being artificially carved, but these marks had been weathered by time, becoming faint and scattered.
In secret realms, human-made ruins often hide treasures but also danger.
This particular Ming Shen Mountain Secret Realm had been explored several times by the Xing family's Nascent Soul cultivators, and they still held the place in high regard.
This indicated that the Xing family had not yet obtained the important treasures hidden within.
This showed the potential danger of the secret realm.
Just at this moment, the ghostly mist above suddenly began to churn violently.
A vengeful spirit shot out from the mist.
This vengeful spirit was extremely strange in appearance.
It had three human heads, a snake-like body, four arms, and several insect-like legs.
Each of the three heads was twisted and terrifying, revealing endless resentment and pain.
It appeared to be a fusion of multiple souls, forced together by some unknown power into this distorted, monstrous form.
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