His fist contained a fierce Yuan Qi, and after attacking, Yang Kai moved with a flicker avoiding the long, coiled tail of the big snake.
The big snake turned around wanting to attack, but the spot that was attacked by Yang Kai a moment ago transmitted a dull thumping sound, and the flesh tore open slowly and blood gushed out. The burning hot True Yang Yuan Qi erupted in its body, opening a wound on its skin, and from that spot, blood poured out in a torrent.
The big snake suppressed its pain and moved its several foot long body like a whip, stirring up dust clouds on the mountaintop. Yang Kai wrinkled his brow, he understood that he had overestimated the strength of this big snake.
When he suddenly saw such a big fellow a moment ago, he thought that it must at least be a fifth realm Monster Beast, and didn’t think that his attack would be able to injure it.
It was not a fifth or sixth realm, it could at most be regarded as a fourth realm Monster Beast which was equal to a Separation and Reunion Boundary martial artist.
It was so big and had such an intimidating appearance.
Yang Kai gained more confidence, stood where he was and gave an opening to the snake who was tumbling towards him. The big snake started rolling even more fiercely. It obviously didn’t want to sit waiting for its death. The snake uncoiled its long tail with a fierce lunge towards Yang Kai while howling.
If not for his movement technique to assist him, then perhaps this strike would have created a small problem for Yang Kai. But with it, avoiding such an attack was very simple.
Seeing that its attack failed, the big snake started hissing then it opened its mouth and spewed out a thick blood-coloured mist. If Yang Kai didn’t dodge it quickly he would had been covered in it from head to toe.
Yang Kai became serious, he didn’t fear this big snake but the poison mist that it spewed was a little troublesome. But it was only a small trouble, and if he was able to dodge this poison mist then this snake was simply unable to injure him.
While Yang Kai was battling the snake outside, the Soul Breaking Awl which was inside with Old Demon wasn’t in an ideal situation. Although Old Demon couldn’t currently display his full strength, but any living being was vulnerable inside. And even though the Soul Breaking Awl wasn’t a sharp weapon, it still was a weapon.
The big snake’s body became damaged and the pain made it unable to fight against Yang Kai. The long body of the big snake started to display a series of movements, sometimes twitching and jerking accompanied by rolling back and forth and even jumping.
Yang Kai watched it with rapt attention and didn’t try to attack it again.
The big snake was not strong but had an exuberant vitality. After half an hour, in which Old Demon was moving inside its body unrestrainedly, it finally stopped struggling and died quietly on the ground.
A creeping motion could be seen on the abdomen of the big snake, and Old Demon, who was bound to the Soul Breaking Awl, drilled his way through and floated in front of Yang Kai. They both looked at each other speechlessly.
“Young master if there will be a next time, please inform this old servant beforehand, this old servant needs to prepare his heart.” Old Demon said slightly accusingly. He was suddenly thrown into the Monster Beast’s mouth by Yang Kai, even if he was courageous it still made him frightened out of his wits.
“En.”
Yang Kai gave an earnest nod.
Old Demon didn’t dare to say anymore.
Yang Kai asked, “Don’t you think that this Monster Beast was quite unusual?”
“Why was it unusual?” Old Demon asked curiously.
“Its strength was very……. low! At least, lower than what I assumed.”
Old Demon gave a smile and said, “Young master, this big snake had swallowed the Congealing Blood Bead allowing it to transform so naturally it didn’t have any real skill. Moreover, when you were walking here, did you discover any Monster Beasts?”
Yang Kai shook his head.
“Then it can only mean that this thing was perhaps only a small snake that had swallowed the Congealing Blood Bead and with some luck didn’t die but became a Monster Beast, and it can be said that it was the only Monster Beast in this place.”
“Can an ordinary snake turn into such a big fellow?” Yang Kai said with amazement, “Fierce.”
“Fierce.”
Then he suddenly thought of a possibility and said with a little excitement, “If a small snake can swallow it then I should not have any issues.”
“Well it can’t be said absolutely; after all, you are a human. If young master wants to confirm then as an experiment swallow the Monster Core first.”
“This proposal is good.” Yang Kai nodded.
He then went up to the snake’s body, cut it and before digging around inside and retrieving the Monster Core
The core was unexpectedly blood red in color as well. It was only the size of a pigeon’s egg and its inside contained some of the Congealing Blood Bead’s Energy.
Asking Old Demon to protect him, Yang Kai rubbed the Core on his clothes then directly placed it inside his pocket.
After revolving the True Yang Secret Art, Yang Kai then felt that there was some kind of energy entering his abdomen, which directly entered his body with a lot of evil Qi contaminating it. This must be the Qi of the young devil who died in this place.
In an instant Yang Kai’s body also became incomparably red and bright like blood and he seemed to be full of evil Qi.
Although he looked fearsome on the outside but on the inside there wasn’t much danger. Yang Kai felt his mind being affected briefly, but it became steady after some time. The True Yang Yuan Qi in his meridians was naturally opposed to the Yin nature of the evil Qi, so he naturally didn’t fear it.
The evil Qi was gradually burned under the revolution of True Yang Secret Art leaving behind only the essence.
The essence obtained was not of the Yang attribute, so it was unable to form Yang liquid and strangely enough it was not absorbed by the Unyielding Golden Body, but was absorbed by his flesh and blood making each cell to dance with joy from top to bottom, every muscle in his body kept moving with energy.
To consume the energy in the core, Yang Kai needed a day, and when he opened his eyes again his pupils flashed like lightning. Yang Kai felt that his whole body wasn’t the same as before.
It was not a promotion of his boundary nor was it an increase in his mental state but it was a change of his mortal body. His body was stronger than before absorbing the core. His vitality increased and his body had strengthened enough that he could do close combat without using much of his Yuan Qi.
“Young master, how do you feel?” Old Demon asked softly.
“I feel good, is the major function of the Congealing Blood Bead to improve a person’s body?”
“Naturally it is, the Young Devil’s essence is also able to help in the promotion of boundary but its major function is to strengthen the quality of the physique.”
“You said that it can also help in increasing boundary?”
Old Demon spoke with a haste, “Young master your understanding is quite shallow. The increase in boundary doesn’t only mean the promotion of boundary but it also means strengthening of the mortal body, deeper Yuan Qi, a deeper understanding of martial arts and martial skills, various types of growth can be also called the promotion of boundary. For example young master, if you compare yourself off now to you of a few days ago, your physique is better, which has resulted in an increase of your boundary.
Yang Kai stared at him, then after pondering for a little while, he said, “Yes, what you said is correct, my understanding is quite shallow.”
“Young master, after all, is young and had not pondered over these things.” Old Demon said, not daring to claim credit.
When Yang Kai looked at that giant stone, it still contained three Congealing Blood Beads. Yang Kai didn’t hesitate at all, and directly put his hand on the first drop.
This Congealing Blood Bead seemed as if it could think on its own, it moved instantly, and directly snuck inside Yang Kai’s body
A much more violent energy compared to before exploded inside Yang Kai. Yang Kai couldn’t bear giving a disgruntled snort then hurriedly closed his eyes to sit in meditation.
In the following half a month, Yang Kai not only absorbed the energy in the three drops of Congealing Blood Bead, but he also drained the energy stored in the giant stone.
The vitality of his body had doubled compared to half a month before. His speed and strength also had a remarkable promotion.
Moreover, he also broke through to the Qi Transforming Stage third layer.
Half a month later under Old Demon’s suggestion, Yang Kai used his hand to move the giant stone out of the way. He did it without using Yuan Qi and with only brute strength, but he was able to easily lift a 1500 kg stone.
Under the stone, there was a cold tunnel which was flooded with dense black Qi. This was obviously the root cause of the demon Qi on the right peninsula of Red Cloud Island.
After being released, this dense fog of Demon Qi unexpectedly directly moved towards Yang Kai.
Old Demon gave a strange smile, “Little thing, the trick that this Old Man tried to play, unexpectedly you also want to try. You really don’t know the immensity of Heaven and Earth!”
What Old Demon was referring to was obviously his and Yang Kai’s first awkward meeting in which Old Demon also tried to capture Yang Kai’s mortal body. At that time he used up all of his tricks but was still subdued by Yang Kai in the end.
While speaking he also changed into a black fog and moved forward to meet it.
Two groups of black fog melted together, and immediately a war started inside the tunnel. In all the ruckus Yang Kai was unable to see anything. He didn’t even understand who was winning and who was losing but then thought that Old Demon was, after all, an Old Devil and he also boasted a lot so he shouldn’t have any problem.
After waiting for a long time, Yang Kai asked, “The immortal soul of this devil is also same as yours but why can it be preserved in the world?”
Old Demon appeared to be in a somewhat difficult position, “Young…..master, his……immortal soul has already collapsed but only some residual…..intent remains!”
Yang Kai knitted his brows and asked, “Is there a problem?”
Old Demon became embarrassed in an instant and said, “This old servant ……asks young master to give him a helping hand. This old servant’s tricks….. are unable to win against him.”
Yang Kai became speechless immediately, then putting on a serious face trying to suppress his laughter he asked, “Isn’t that a young devil? How are you unable to win against him?”
Listening to Yang Kai ridiculing him Old Demon was about to cry, “Yes yes, this young devil is good, but this old servant died earlier than him and my immortal soul was about to break while being sealed in the Heaven’s Cave Inheritance. Young Master if you don’t help then I fear that this old servant will be swallowed by him.”
After hearing this, Yang Kai realized the gravity of the situation and asked, “How do I help?”
“This brat who doesn’t know good from bad, he just wants to occupy your body, you only need to leave him to his own devices and the same thing will happen as in the Heaven’s Cave Inheritance.
This was simple to do, Yang Kai just opened his hand towards the tunnel.
In an instant, a cold aura flowed into him through his hand and crashed directly into his body. Yang Kai smiled without worry.
And really under the revolution of the True Yang Secret Art, this cold aura was burnt away and absorbed, which was followed by a miserable howling cry. After this cold energy was built up there was only some essence left which was absorbed by the Unyielding Golden Body.
With the assistance from Yang Kai, Old Demon was finally able to draw level with the weakening devil and finally, after an hour he was able to get the winning side.
“Enough, it’s enough young master, now you can watch from the side, how this old servant swallows this little thing.” Old Demon hurriedly stopped him for fear that Yang Kai would rob him of even the Demon Qi
Then he whispered in his heart, [How is this young master able to absorb this energy? Doesn’t the young master practice a Yang attribute secret law? It really is strange.]
Hearing him say that Yang Kai also took back his hand from the tunnel and then ignored Old Demon. He started chewing the spirit medicine which he had found.
Yang Kai was knowledgeable about the spirit medicines that he had picked, and thus knew they didn’t contain any toxins. They were valuable and useful if refined into pills as they would be more effective.
However, at present, he was basically in captivity. There was obviously no opportunity to have them refined. Although they could be preserved he was presently unable to do so.
The war between Old Demon and that black fog continued all day long and finally stopped after the two groups of black fog had become one.
After this war, Old Demon strength increased greatly.
Old Demon said with a loud voice, “Many thanks, young master, this old servant was able to fulfill your expectations.”
Yang Kai coughed lightly.
While blushing Old Demon said, “I need to close up for a few days.”
Then, without waiting any longer he escaped into Yang Kai’s body.
Even till the next day, the Old Demon was still busy ‘closing up’. Meanwhile, Yang Kai was attempting to absorb the spirit medicine.
With his Unyielding Golden Body, the thing that was capable of absorbing a sea of energy, regardless of its type, he was not afraid in his attempt to absorb the medicine. After all, he knew it was not poisonous, and it was not going to cause any conflict with his Qi.
After a period of time, he had finally completely absorbed the medicine; promoting him from Qi Transformation Third Stage to the Fourth Stage.
Being able to promote a level after arriving on Red Cloud Island for two months means that the trip here was not a complete waste.
Since the immortal soul was absorbed by the Old Demon and the treasure here was all grasped by Yang Kai, he estimated that after a period of time, it would no longer be regarded as a restricted area for the Red Cloud Cultivators.
[Time to go!]Yang Kai scaled back down the mountain and returned to the seashore.
To leave Red Cloud Island, Yang Kai would need a boat. This issue made his head numb from all the contemplation as he knew building his own ship was an unreasonable task. The only possibility of obtaining one was to steal from the Red Cloud Sect so he had to arduously think of a method to obtain it.
[But, even if I manage to obtain an empty boat, how am I supposed to weigh anchor and steer the boat off to sea?]After pondering for some time, Yang Kai suddenly heard the sound of rustling from a distant place. He tilted his head to focus on the sound and could hear someone gasping for breath, mixed with a struggling woman’s cry for mercy.
Yang Kai’s complexion immediately sank as he rushed towards that area.
Yang Kai made it to the scene but was hiding behind the bushes to get a good analysis of the situation. [It’s as I had guessed. The Red Cloud Sect only sends in normal people to this island in order to collect that Black Profound Fruit.]
The scene in front of him was just meters away, of a sturdy guy sitting on top of a woman, tearing her clothes off. The man was panting like a cow, laughing hysterically and obscenely as he proceeded. Meanwhile, the woman under him was struggling to get free, but it was all in vain as she does not have sufficient strength; only leaving her capable of crying for mercy.
[That man has an evil aura!]Yang Kai flashed behind the man. With his foot placed neatly on that bastard’s back, he kicked. It was so strong, that the man flew. Meanwhile, the woman under the man got free, and hurriedly gathered her clothes. With her body still trembling from the event, she hid behind Yang Kai for protection.
Once the man noticed that the ground had disappeared from under his feet, he wailed out in misery. It was when he finally got back to the ground, that he hurriedly stood up and stared at Yang Kai with an ominous light.
Both of his eyes turned scarlet as his face wrapped itself in hostility. It was obvious, at this point, that his mind was about to be consumed by the Demonic Qi emitting from his body. Even his nostrils were giving off steam.
“Yes?” Yang Kai sighed. From the looks of this person’s clothing, it was obvious that he was poor. It was highly likely that he had been thrown in and out of the island numerous times already. With such experiences, it was even more probable that his mind was losing its natural state and turning him into some beast. With all of this taken into consideration, Yang Kai did not wish to kill that man. Instead, the boy merely gave him a kick.
“Brat! Get lost!” The man said while grimacing. Since he was about to go so far, how would he possibly be willing to care about Yang Kai’s presence and give up?
Yang Kai only returned an uninterested look and very soon, the man standing in front of him charged over like a mad bull. His face, now filled with rage, turned murderous.
“Then, I shall release you from your pain…” Yang Kai stood at the same place. When the man rushing towards him was close enough, he took his hand and pointed it towards the man’s chest. Yang Yuan Qi soon injected itself into the man’s heart; stopping it instantly. Without the slightest bit of pain, the man’s body turned limp as his life force disappeared.
Behind him, was the lady sobbing in mourning. Hearing those weak hiccups, Yang Kai felt uncomfortable as well. He turned around in an attempt to comfort. But once he turned around, and his eyes laid focus on her face, his whole mind shivered.
This woman seems as though she was in her 30s. By her white and tender skin, she should be gorgeous. However, right now, there was a horrendous scar tearing through her face. Each mark, about a nail thick, spanned across her entire face. Even the dried up blood around the wound did not seem to have been completely scrapped off; though even if it was, her beauty could never be restored.
The sight of the woman was terrifying to fathom but even as she covered herself with the ripped clothes, and hid her face, she was crying with a small expression of gratitude.
Knowing her own appearance, even as she felt grateful to her savior, she retreated. She did not wish to frighten Yang Kai.
Yang Kai’s whole body seemed to turn cold as he extends his hand to grasp the woman’s wrist.
“No… Please stop…” The woman tried to struggle.
Yang Kai remained undisturbed and used his other hand to gently lift up her head.
“Please… I beg you to stop…” The woman continued to beg. As her tears continued to fall from her cheeks, she weakly looked at Yang Kai, causing the scar on her face to seem a little more terrifying.
In the meantime, Yang Kai’s eyes did not seem to hold any sense of lust and disgust. Instead, it held slight sadness and hesitation. After lifting her chin up, his shaking hand moved to clear away the black hair blocking his view, to reveal her entire face.
The woman closed her eyes. It was unclear if she was afraid of her own appearance or if Yang Kai’s actions had startled her. Regardless, tears were still continuously streaming down her face.
Yang Kai’s pupils contracted as he took a long and good look at the woman before sounding off. “Madame?”
Hearing him refer to her in such a familiar manner, the woman slowly opened her eyes. Even with tears clouding her pupils, she still looked at Yang Kai carefully with a flash of doubt hovering in her mind. Once she recognized him, her doubt gradually vanished and was replaced with a sense of surprise and joy.
“Madame, is that really you?” Yang Kai is unable to believe that his hunch was right after his eyes first lay on this woman. He thought that he had seen someone familiar. Moments ago, his impulsive and weird actions were simply because he wanted to confirm if his hunch was right.
After the woman heard Yang Kai’s voice, she thought back to the time, two months ago, of the beggar who was covered in dirt. Trembling, she spoke, “Little Beggar, is that you?”
Yang Kai took a deep breath. After he heard those two words from her, he knew that his hunch was right. [I would have never thought I would find the Madame of the Jiang Family here!]
There were only three people that referred to him as a Little Beggar. The first was Cui Er, the second was the Jiang Family’s Young Lady and the third was the Madame of the Jiang Family.
“Why are you here? What happened to your face?” Yang Kai asked, filled with doubts. [Cui Er and the two women from the Jiang Family should currently be in Sea City, under the protection of the Miao Family. So why is the Madame here? On the day we moved onto our different paths, Miao Hua Cheng had personally come to welcome them. After all, the Young Lady had an engagement to the Miao Family. As such, the Madame should be living her life, safe within the Miao Family. Just how did matters get so out of hand that she landed here?]
“Young Hero…” After recognizing Yang Kai, the Little Beggar who had previously rescued her, the Madame suddenly knelt down onto the ground. *Bang* With her head stuck to the ground, she cried out in grief, “Please, I beg of you, help me uphold justice for my Jiang Family!”
Yang Kai quickly tried to help her up. When he got a glimpse of her face again, she had blood flowing from her forehead – evident that she was extremely desperate.
“This is not a place for us to speak. Come, we must leave here first.” Yang Kai held her in the arm and supported her to hurriedly walk away.
[Why did her appearance change so much? Why would she be caught and be sent to the Red Cloud Sect? Where are Cui Er and the Young Lady? What happened to the Miao Family?] Yang Kai’s mind was flooded with questions.Although they were not close to him, they had, at the very least, lived with him for serval days. Furthermore, it was fun to talk to Cui Er. He could not forget her kindness in bringing him snacks to share and her smart-alecky charming personality. Likewise, for her good heart and kind nature.
After a long time of walking, Yang Kai led the Madame to the hill top – which was considered to be the deeper parts of the Red Cloud Island, somewhere no normal human should be able to reach.
The people found a place to sit down. The woman, who suddenly thought of the miracle of meeting Yang Kai, broke down in excitement.
Yang Kai did not comfort her. Instead, he allowed her to carry on crying. After all, there was no rush. He had many questions to ask and he knew that the Madame had many matters to inform him of.
Only after half an hour, did the Madame’s cries subside. With her hair covering her face, she held her trembling body.
Yang Kai took off his own coat to place it over her.
“Thank you…” Even if she was in a pitiful state, the Madame did not forgo her courtesy.
“Please, tell me. What happened?”
The Madame’s eyes reveal a slight disconnect as she reminisces of the past. With a low and deep voice, she narrated the entire story for Yang Kai.
“Cui Er, Huan Er (The Young Lady) and I all went to the Miao family with Miao Hua Cheng. For the first few days, Miao Hua Cheng treated us as honorable guests in his house. However, when I talked to him about Huan Er’s wedding, he pushed back the date from three months to four months. At first, I did not care too much about it. When I talked to him about a few days later, he agreed to it but held up some condition. He said that his son’s status was honorable and my family’s Huan Er did not match with him. If she wanted to marry him, she can at most be his concubine! I was furious but did not say anything else.
On the next day, I immediately told Huan Er and Cui Er to pack their things. I wished to leave the Miao Family. We had experienced so much hardship to come to Sea City and it was not to have my daughter become someone’s concubine! What’s more, this was a marriage that he and my husband had agreed upon! How could he just go against his words like this?!
But, without waiting for us to leave the Miao Family, Miao Hua Cheng got angry and detained all of us.” The Madame’s face held a frightened look as she spoke. It was evident that this whole situation was a nightmare to her.
Her expression turned even worse, appearing more depressed as she sobbed. “I did not understand why Miao Hua Cheng would do all of this. However, under inquiry of others, I finally got to know the truth. He was the one who pulled the strings behind our backs! The death of my poor husband was due to his bribery of those in the Tong Province. After my husband’s death, he reached out to me, reminding me of the marriage agreement my Huan Er had with his son. How laughable… to think that I was caught unaware and drove my daughter to a tiger’s den…”
“Why did he do something like this? Weren’t your husband and Miao Hua Cheng best friends?” Yang Kai thought that the matters spoken here were more than what meets the eyes. On the day that he had personally seen Miao Hua Cheng, with his sorrowful voice and saddened looks, it was clearly just an act!
Update: This chapter has now been proofread. Sorry for the wait everyone!
After listening to Yang Kai’s inquiry, the Madame could only give a pitiful smile as she explained. “When I wished to find out about the reasons why Miao Hua Cheng treated me, a poor widowed mother, in such a way, I tried every means that I could think of. In the end, it came down to the thing my husband and that man obtained years ago.”
“What thing?”
“A piece of a tortoise shell!” The Madame replied, “My husband and Miao Hua Cheng once, in the past, travelled around Sea City for leisure. They happened to stumble upon a strangle tortoise shell which displayed some kind of map. At that time, the two looked around the nearby islands in hopes to find a match with the map. Unfortunately, the place did not seem to tally with the map so they assumed that the shell must have been a fake. However, just to ensure that the other party remained discreet about their find, they split the shell into two and shared it.”
The Madame gently gasped for breath before continuing on. “After their adventures here, my husband went back to the Tong Province and started to build up his own school. Meanwhile, Miao Hua Cheng settled down in Sea City. He most likely continued to study and research the tortoise shell. It was only in recent years that he had managed to obtain some form of clue. Being unwilling to share with my husband, he chose to murder him; even going as far as to trick my whole family to migrate to Sea City. I personally had once seen the half of the tortoise shell owned by my husband. Since I knew it was a precious, I took it along with me.”
“Young Hero, do you remember the late guard Zhang Ding? The one who rebelled against me?”
“His actions were puppeteered by Miao Hua Cheng?” Yang Kai’s eyes narrowed.
“Exactly!” The Madame’s head sank down. “I believe that since Miao Hua Cheng was considered to be my husband’s best friend, he did not wish to personally begin with us. Thus, he made use of Zhang Ding, inciting him to make the first move. Without you, Young Hero, I believe all of us, Huan Er Cui Er and I, would have been sent to accompany my husband in the afterlife.”
“Certainly a best friend!” Yang Kai gave a smile of ridicule. However, there was still some doubt in his mind that he wished to clarify. “Madame, all three of you are average human beings. After you entered the Miao Family, if Miao Hua Cheng truly wanted to obtain that shell from you, it would be such a simple task. How is it possible that it was only later that he revealed his true colours?”
The Madame bitterly grinned. “At the beginning, even I did not understand why that was the case. However, after a while, I managed to figure it out; and it was all thanks to you.”
“?!”
*En* the Madame nods and resumed her explanation. “When Miao Hua Cheng greeted us, I followed your instructions and told him that a powerful cultivator had assisted us to kill Zhang Ding; allowing us to survive his rebellion. Since Miao Hua Cheng is a careful person, he first waited to check and see if the person we had mentioned was hiding around us. Thus, he did not dare to begin. When he had finally realized that there was no one there to protect us, he then revealed his true colours.”
Yang Kai nodded in agreement, as he found her logic sound.
“So, what happened next?”
“The nightmare started.” The Madame’s voice mellowed down, as though she was about to break down into tears to cry but she persisted to speak. “To save our lives, I handed the other half of the tortoise shell. But, I would not have thought that Miao Hua Cheng would have been cruel enough to continue his torture.” While she spoke, the woman’s body shivered incessantly as she subconsciously tightened her fist. “On that very night, after I passed him the tortoise shell, Miao Hua Cheng brought a group of people to take Huan Er away… He said that she must be wed to his son. When Huan Er was unwilling to comply, Cui Er stood up to aid her. But… But… I never would have thought Miao Hua Cheng would be so heartless as to order his men to beat her to death.”
Hearing about such a vicious scene, Yang Kai’s whole body could not be controlled as he trembled in anguish and anger.
The Madame continued to sob as she spoke. “On the next day, Miao Hua Cheng told me that my precious daughter… My Huan Er, had been raped! Unable to bear it… She bit her tongue to commit suicide!”
Yang Kai felt his whole body turn cold as the rage within him welled up without any possible way to control it. He would have never expected for the cheeky but charming young housemaid to be so brutally killed while the shy and gentle young lady would commit suicide. In just two months after travelling with them, he would never be able to meet these beauties ever again.
“Miao Hua Cheng also wanted to humiliate me!” The Madame sobbed while stuttering. “But… learning from his mistake with Huan Er and Cui Er… He no longer dared to go too far. After detaining me for several days, without being able to bend my will, he got angry out of shame and sold me to a place called Thousand Gold Wine House.”
Yang Kai does not need to inquire about the building as he knew that it was a brothel.
“Forcing me to submit, I was beaten and tortured… Without any hope of rescue, I sliced my face using a pair of scissors! *He… Hee…* Having such an appearance, no man would ever dare touch me.” The Madame pitifully ridiculed herself. “Afterwards, I was sold to the Red Cloud Sect with a smile plastered on my face…”
“I should have died. With my husband gone, along with my daughter and Cui Er; what is the point of me being alive? However, I cannot allow myself to die. Not now. If I die, no one would know about the horrendous treatment they have unjustly suffered. I must live! Live till I can finally seek the revenge they deserve. Although I am just a weak woman, this is something that I must do.”
Yang Kai’s heart cramped up as he could feel a piercing sensation overwhelm every fiber of his being, causing his heart to bleed out. Taking a deep breath, he comforted the woman, “Madame, you are the world’s most beautiful wife and the world’s strongest mother!”
[It was easy to choose death but living in such a state would be unbearable, to say the least.]
“Young Hero, can I ask you to help me one last time?” The Madame lifted her head with tearful eyes, staring at Yang Kai with a look of hope.
Standing on the mountain top, with the howling of the wind, Yang Kai’s whole face remained solemn as he sighed. “It’s regrettable but my strength is too low!”
The Madame immediately turned gloomy.
“But, I will continue to grow stronger. I might take several years to finally be able to pay the Miao Family in Sea City a visit.”
Yang Kai’s decision was not only based on the Madame’s request but also the debt he felt towards Cui Er for the food that she had given him while they were travelling together.
The Madame’s facial expression changed to that of overwhelming joy as she kneeled to the ground and kowtowed. “Thank you… Thank you Young Hero!”
It was only after a long time, did she finally straighten up her body to speak. “Young Hero, although you already know that Miao Hua Cheng was the mastermind behind all of this, there is something else that you need to know. The ones that are backing Miao Hua Cheng is the Red Clouds Sect!”
*En?!* Yang Kai’s brows wrinkled.
“Miao Hua Cheng’s son, Miao Lin is a Red Clouds Sect Disciple. Due to his son’s low status, Miao Hua Cheng plans on giving away the tortoise shell to the Red Clouds Sect as a form of contribution; in hopes to make sure that his son has a higher standing within the Sect. It was all because of that rotten child, who had no hope of gaining recognition within the Red Clouds Sect. He pinned everything on the tortoise shell and instigated his father to be so treacherous to my Jiang Family!”
“Red Clouds Sect! I knew it!” Yang Kai nods.
“Young Hero!” Madame Cheng pursed her lips as he hung her head down. With a shivering voice, she spoke. “Although I know that you are just enough to seek retribution for my Jiang Family, and humane enough to not forget the benevolence Cui Er had showed you, there is nothing my family can do to thank you.”
“You don’t need to care about that.”
“Young Hero, please listen to me…” The Madame insisted, causing Yang Kai to nod.
“In actuality, after my husband had obtained the other half of the tortoise shell, he too had spent years studying and researching it. Similar to Miao Hua Cheng, he also obtained the other portion of the map. Inferring from what my husband had shared with me before, one of the tortoise shell is a map routing to the location of the island. Meanwhile, the other half of the map that he had obtained contained the interior route within the island.
“What?” Yang Kai was caught in surprise. “So, where is this map?”
“It’s on me.” The woman replied with an unnatural voice.
Yang Kai had his doubts immediately after the Madame spoke. [How was it possible for a normal woman to be able to defend against Miao Hua Cheng’s search for that crucial map piece?]
After staying silent for a long time, the Madame finally affirmed her resolve and opened her mouth to speak. “Young Hero, since I am unable to repay the debt of gratitude that my family has owed you, please accept this map as your reward!” Using her hands, the Madame grabbed her pants and ripped it open, to reveal a large section of her snow-white thighs.
“The map has been embroidered onto my skin by myself!” Hanging her head down, with her shivering body, the Madame roused up all her courage to do the deed.
Yang Kai’s complexion quickly dyed red as his eyes quickly avoided in the other direction, gulping down his saliva. After several days of promoting his cultivation level and overall strength, the Yin-Yang Joyous Unification Art had a stronger influence over him. It was a common occurrence for Su Yan’s face to flash in his mind. If not for the strength of meditation, he would definitely not be able to overcome his desires. Now, with the Madame’s display, Yang Kai could feel that he was about to lose himself.
“Madame…” Yang Kai frowned.
“Young Hero…” The Madame’s complexion was also red. “This is something my husband has died for. I do not want to bury it nor let it fall into the enemy’s hands. Please, consider this a reward that I deliver to you, Young Hero. Please accept it.”
Yang Kai sighed. [If I reject it, she will definitely be hurt…] “Ah! I’m sorry to offend you then Madame!”
Squatting down, Yang Kai took a good look at the Madame’s thigh. There was a place with high mountain ridges, which formed out the shape of the island. Many areas on the map were specially labelled in great detail. What’s more, there was an obvious winding pathway that was meant to be taken.
[This map… it was embroidered using a heated needle, inked with coloured pigment… To think that the Madame’s entire thigh, from the knee to her groin area has been painted with this. I can’t begin to imagine how formidable her will must be for her to endure such torture. She is just a normal woman yet, just how many times did she pierce herself to form out this map of rivers and mountains? Although the map is probably inaccurate and most likely different from the original map, I can’t say anything…]
Yang Kai tried to maintain his calm and composed self as he sized up the map carefully; not allowing the least bit of his shock and awe to be shown. Meanwhile, the Madame was still shaking. As both her eyes were kept shut, her tears keep flowing.
After the time to heat up a cup of tea, Yang Kai had memorised the entire map and took up the torn cloth to hide her thigh.
“Young Hero, thank you for all your hard work.” The Madame sat on the ground sideways while speaking with a soft voice.
After she said her piece, it was as if all the burdens in her heart had been relinquished. Yang Kai could tell from her facial expression that she currently only sought death. [Her heart has died. She lived for revenge and now that I am here, her desires have been passed on to me. So… she no longer has the will to live…]
After looking at her facial expression, Yang Kai no longer spoke.
After one day, Yang Kai descended the mountain, he took the basket that the Madame brought with her, with a Profound Black Fruit inside. He walked towards the seashore step by step and looked back to the mountain top.
At the mountain top, sat the Madame with a face drained of tears. She was looking out into the ocean, in a daze; motionless.
Yang Kai did not lead her to leave. Instead, he left her there, knowing that letting her live was far more torturous than allowing her to choose her death. [Now… all she wished for was to be extricated…]
After several hours, Yang Kai arrived at the seashore recovery point and patiently waited for the Red Clouds Sect steamship to pick him up.
Many people were gathered here, waiting for the steamship to arrive. When they first caught sight of the steamship, everyone cried out with cheers.
At the side of the ship, a Red Clouds Sect cultivator was blocking their paths into the ship. He was inspecting everyone’s harvest and was given the duty of taking away everyone’s baskets while tossing anyone with less than 1.5kg of Profound Black Fruit out of the ship. Those that were unfortunate enough to be thrown to sea would be food for the Monster Beasts living in the sea.
Among dozens of individuals, only 34 that had not completed the task were tossed out of the ship. As they fell into the treacherous sea, pitiful yells could be heard. Dreadfully, the end of their voices also signaled a meal for the Monster Beasts.
Yang Kai mingled among the crowd unnoticed as these people were all normal. With those forced to pick Profound Black Fruit being average people, none of the Red Clouds Sect disciples paid them any heed.
After half an hour, the steamship finally started and left the island; leaving behind those that did not gather, and those that acted as feed for the Monster Beasts.
Returning to the Red Clouds Sect’s made Yang Kai somewhat depressed. Originally, he had planned to do everything in his power to steal the ship and escape this place. But, after meeting the Madame, escape was something he did not wish to do.
Since the Red Cloud Sect had obtained the one piece of the Tortoise Shell, he needed to take action. It was only fortunate that the other half, the most important one, was in his grasp. Since the Madame had such courage to mark the map on her body, he could not allow her efforts to be in vain. At least, not when it was also her dying wish.
[If everything goes according to plan, the Red Cloud Sect will take action within 1-2 months.] Yang Kai speculated.
Originally, Miao Hua Cheng wished to obtain the completed Tortoise Shell to give it to the Red Cloud Sect for his son. However, there was another aspect to him delivering them this gift; the dangers of an unknown area. Miao Hua Cheng hoped to take advantage of the Red Cloud Sect, to help him explore the area, while at the same time allowing his son to gain status within the Sect; minimising the risk to himself while still receiving benefits. Regardless of Miao Hua Cheng’s plans, Yang Kai wished to go to the island. The unknown secrets the island held were risks worthy for Yang Kai.
[Now, the only issue is getting the opportunity be covert while travelling with the Red Cloud Sect… Since they already have the map in their hands, I would never be able to get a chance to obtain some chances if I were to stick next to them the whole time.]
During the several nights on the ship, Yang Kai frequently went around to chat with some disciples for information. He found out that once the higher-levels of the Sect received the map, they immediately started making preparations to go out to explore.
Unfortunately, ordinary disciples were not well versed regarding this matter. They only got to know hints from overhearing the higher-ups speak. Thus, they were not too clear with the specifics.
While enduring the hardships onboard the ship and trying to think of an opportunity to covertly explore the island on the map, the yelling of the Red Cloud Sect disciples could suddenly be heard in the morning. It was an order for those normal people to gather.
The shock from this strange order caused many of those people to have panicked looks on their faces. Meanwhile, soft murmurs were passed on from the people, “Why are we going back to pick the fruit again? We just came back several days ago… In the past, we would have at least a month before being forced to pick that fruit again.”
“Listen up. This time, you are not going out to pick the fruit that you usually do. Stop talking amongst each other and do not ask any questions. We will tell you when we reach the shore.” A Red Cloud Sect disciple reprimanded the crowd with a stern look on his face.
Once Yang Kai heard of this news, his heart immediately jumped in excitement as he suddenly opened his eyes.
[Good! If I’m not wrong, this is an opportunity!]
Arriving at the seashore as per usual, the first thing that they could see was a huge, not exaggerating to call it oversized, ship of 66.6 meters was docked. This ship had a total of five masts, each hung a huge sail flapping in the wind; and as the stern of the ship was held high with dragon head to show off its might and prestige, it made all around aware of its presence – taking the breaths away from the crowd of people who were inexperienced in being under such a big ship.
“My god, this is the Red Cloud Sect’s biggest ship! Where do they want to take us to?” A man who had the ability to judge that ship whispered in a soft voice.
Seeing such a ship, affirmed Yang Kai’s guess.
He had spent countless hours trying to think of a way to infiltrate Red Cloud Sect while they were exploring. However, never had he thought that his efforts would be in vain as they presented the opportunity to him on a platter.
[The Red Cloud Sect most likely is not bringing in so many normal to explore the place and find the treasure. It is extremely likely that what they need is manpower to operate the ship. Such a humongous ship will definitely need an unnerving amount of manpower to operate smoothly…] after Yang Kai thought of this point, he appeared to have calmed down. [Since this is a Red Cloud Sect Ship that is going to head out to explore an unknown area, there will definitely be a high level martial artist, no less than the level of True Element Boundary! He might even reach Immortal Ascension!]
Yang Kai could hide in front of a True Element Boundary martial artist but if an Immortal Ascension cultivator were to show up, he could easily uncover his cultivation level with Spiritual Sense. Thus, Yang Kai knew that he must be careful, not showing the slightest bit of his skill or else, he would end up a lifeless ragdoll.
After waiting for a long time, a group of Red Cloud Sect members came out, and leading the group to walk in a straight line were two oldies. The old birds, a man and a woman, were merrily chatting while they led. Their heads were both ravaged by silver hair but in contrast to their dignified spark that came from their eyes, they were lively and full of vigor. Without a doubt, these two could be easily considered as two of the top cultivators in the Red Cloud Sect.
Following behind them were a batch of Red Cloud Sect disciples, of either gender; about 50 heads in count. They held a presence that indicated they were the Elite Disciples within the Sect.
A middle-aged man from the large ship came out hastily, to pay his respects to the two elders. “Greetings Masters.”
The Red Cloud Sect disciples on the ship also followed suit.
Both the old man and old woman responded with a faint smile as they jumped gracefully and floated into the ship and asked, “Has everything been prepared?”
The middle-aged man respectfully responded, “Everything is ready. All I need is your orders, Master, before we can set sail!”
*En!* The old man nodded and beckoned with one hand while speaking, “You will continue to do the arrangement. Master Lan and I will be in the cabins, focused on cultivating. If there are no urgent matters that you need us to attend to, do not call for us.”
“Yes!”
When the two Immortal Ascension Cultivators entered their cabin, Yang Kai could not help but feel relieved.
[Being tasked to do all the arrangements for this, that middle-aged man must not have a low status within the Sect…]
After issuing orders for half an hour, the ship finally began to move. When it was slowly starting to move, Yang Kai was at the deck, working in disguise as he tried to remember the direction that the ship had been heading towards.
This ginormous ship was capable of running through the waters, and within just a mere 24 hours, it had travelled more than 500 kilometers, entering into the open seas without any land in view.
The sun set and the moon rose in cycles, and soon enough, Yang Kai had been on this ship for the past three days, living as cautiously as possible. In the meantime, he would sometimes take the opportunity to chat with the martial artists on board and gained more clarification regarding his situation.
It was now affirmed that this ship was meant to explore that mysterious island on the map. ‘Hidden Island’, was what the Red Cloud Sect members referred to that island whenever they spoke; which reminded Yang Kai of the many interesting stories he had heard from Sea City.
The Hidden Island held a wide variety of rumors since there were mirages of it caught by people’s eyes. Even in Sea City, numerous residents had experienced sightings of the mirage of this island! However, no one knew why it appeared in the form of a mirage, appearing at a remote place, millions of kilometers away from its original location. But, it was widely agreed upon that the Island did exist out at sea except no one had been able to find it.
In Sea City, it was said that no common technique could be used to find the island. The only possible way, was to have a direct guide towards the place. The people who tried to explore the area followed islands to get close to the place but even so, they were only able to get close. Being unable to see it, they could not get ashore. Thus, it was named the Hidden Island!
There were a large number of rumors that indicated the place contained never ending wealth, as well as Martial Skills and Cultivation Techniques that are sure to allow a human to promote by leaps and bounds.
Common men all wished to get into Hidden Island but because they were unable to, many had given up such thoughts. But now, the Red Cloud Sect had finally obtained the opportunity to set foot there! Sparing no resources, they sent out their Elite Disciples and two Immortal Ascension cultivators!
For Red Cloud Sect to use two of their four Immortal Ascension Cultivators had shown their obvious determination to explore and harvest the island.
For the past few days, most of the conversations that Yang Kai would encounter were the Red Cloud Sect disciples’ yearning desires for the island and their imaginations about the opportunities they could encounter there.
Yang Kai also had questions regarding the island and awoke the Old Demon who was closing up. He found out that Hidden Island is most likely not a place like the Heaven’s Cave Inheritance. Instead, it was more likely a place that a Senior Cultivator would use to cultivate. Wishing to avoid any form of disturbance, this Expert made some kind of formation that concealed the island from people’s eyes. In any case, it was extremely likely for the place to exist.
Through conversations he had with the disciples, Yang Kai had remembered all the strengths and names of the strong cultivators within the Sect. The middle-aged person was called Yu Xiu Ping, currently in the True Element Boundary, Ninth Stage, an Elder of the Red Cloud Sect.
Comparing the strength of those top Cultivators of the Red Cloud Sect to High Heaven Pavilion, Yang Kai noted that their Sect was unable to be place on par to his own. Firstly, no True Element Boundary Cultivator could be considered to be an Elder in High Heaven Pavilion. Secondly, if he were to compare the ages of the Two Masters from the Red Cloud Sect to his Elders from High Heaven Pavilion, it was clear that his Elders were much younger than those old farts; Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan. The former was in the fifth stage of Immortal Ascension and the latter was in the Fourth Stage. Both held the positions of Antiquity Elders in the Sect and would typically stay inside the inner areas of the Sect; after all, they already had one foot in the grave. If this was not an important matter to the Sect, they would never have appeared outside of their Sect.
Today, Yang Kai was cleaning the deck in silence and suddenly heard two voices conversing.
“Yan, haven’t you been accompanying Miao Lin?”
Hearing the two words, ‘Miao Lin’ caused Yang Kai’s ears to twitch as he immediately recalled the son of Miao Huang Cheng, the one who had brought the Madame to ruins and brought disaster onto the Jiang Family!
[Could it be, that it’s him?] Yang Kai was now paying close attention to the scene. Not forgetting to continue his disguise, his hands did not stop moving. But, his vision was switching back and forth surreptitiously, to the side of the conversation, sizing up the situation.
On that side of the ship was a beautiful woman that seemed to be in her twenties. She wore a long blue dress and thanks to the magnificent sea breeze, the dress pasted onto her skin, showing her bombshell figure. She had a slender waist and accompanying the two tall and perky peaks, it highlighted her busty figure. She had fair, wheat-like skin, not common with those that live around the seashore. With the color of her skin and those long, slender and jade-like legs, she could steal the hearts of millions. Unfortunately, in the midst of all her beauty, lay an undeniable arrogance that could only be quenched with the best things.
Meanwhile, there was a middle-aged man standing beside her, the elder of the Red Cloud Sect, Yu Xiu Ping!
[So this must be his daughter, Yu Ao An!] Yang Kai now understood the situation very clearly; especially with Yu Ao An. Many of the disciples would discuss about her in secret; just like Su Yan in High Heaven Pavilion, Yu Ao An was woman that was admired by the disciples within the Red Cloud Sect.
Hearing Yu Xiu Ping ask, a touch of impatience emerged on Yu Ao Qing’s face. Grinding her teeth, she spoke, “He is not sticking with me”.
“Oh, you don’t like him?” Yu Xiu Ping teased.
“What do you think?” Yu Ao Qing snapped back.
“Hold your temper. For this matter, we can only rely on him. Although Miao Hua Cheng has given us a map, but he has spent much effort in his research and has not passed any of it on to us. He has passed everything on to Miao Lin so if we want to find the hidden island, he is essential.”, Yu Xiu Ping gently comforted Yu Ao Qing.
Yu Ao Qing bitterly shook her head and grabbed Yu Xiu Ping’s arms, “Dad, it isn’t like you don’t know what kind of person he is. This morning, he wanted to move his hands and feet for me. If you told me again, I would have buried him in the sea.”
Yu Xiu Ping quickly felt a chill running down his spine. “He moved his hands and feet for you?”
“Yes!” Yu Ao Qing felt very wronged. Before this matter, she had never heard of this guy Miao Lin. However, because of this matter, she had bitterly fulfilled his requests to ask for this favor. For the always arrogant girl, this was nothing short of torture.
“I’ve wronged you.” Yu Xiu Ping’s face turned unsightly. Yu Ao Qing was his daughter, he naturally treated her as his treasure and hoped she could wed a dragon among men for a lifetime of happiness. Miao Lin didn’t have any background firstly, any qualifications secondly, and strength thirdly. In the past, he couldn’t even carry his daughter’s shoes if given the opportunity. However, for the sake of Miao Lin’s information, he could only sacrifice his daughter.
“Be at ease, once I find the island, dad will personally seek justice for you!” Yu Xiu Ping promised.
“I really hope I arrive early.” Yu Ao Qing ground her teeth in hatred, “Once we arrive, I will bury him in the sea!”
“As long as you’re happy!” Yu Xiu Ping cracked a smile. He didn’t give the slightest hint of concern; it was as if his daughter was talking about disposing of livestock.
Unfortunately Sea City’s Miao Hua Cheng could not have expected the situation to develop in this direction. When he offered up the map, his only intention was to create a brighter future for his son. He wanted the Red Cloud Sect to pay attention to Miao Lin.
The Red Cloud Sect’s upper management had agreed to Miao Hua Cheng’s request, but they wanted Miao Lin to focus on cultivation. However, they didn’t want Miao Lin to not put in any effort, so they came up with the idea of putting everything on Yu Ao Qing.
This was completely a case of playing with fire and getting burned.
In middle of their conversation, Yu Xiu Ping suddenly mentioned, “When that brat comes over here, you …. if you just can’t take it anymore, just avoid him for a bit. You must remember that you can’t throw a tantrum.”
“I know…” Yu Ao Qing’s perky chest heaved up and down as she took a deep breath.
Yu Xiu Ping quickly left. After a moment, a 20-something year-old man came onto the deck. A glimmer of expectation appeared on his face as he surveyed the four directions. When he gazed at the ship’s side and saw Yu Ao Qing’s back, a flash of happiness that he could not hide appeared on his face.
[That was Miao Lin?]
Miao Lin’s appearance was engraved in his heart, but there was no indication on his face.
The lady of the Jiang family did not want to be humiliated, so she would rather commit suicide.
Miao Lin was an exemplary young man. Aside from some yellow in his complexion, and some swaying in his steps, everything else was above average. If you said he was a martial artist, you might as well call him foppish dandy.
After all, the Miao family in Sea City could be considered to have some strength, this was enough to support him in his revelries.
As he arrived beside Yu Ao Qing, his eyes were filled with obvious care, as he softly and affectionately told her, “Senior Sister Qing, the deck is very windy, be careful of catching a cold.”
Even though Yu Ao Qing was disgusted to death, she squeezed out a stiff smile and replied, “It’s no harm. The water’s breeze is nice and clear. It blows away people’s troubles.”
Yu Ao Qing’s words were very subtle, but it seemed like Miao Lin did not understand at all. With a gentle smile, he warmly spoke. “It appears Senior Sister Qing’s mood is not good. Is it because of some unhappy matter? You might as well tell apprentice brother. I am willing to share your worries with you.”
A trace of hidden anger flickered across Yu Ao Qing’s pretty face, but she still smilingly shook her head.
Yang Kai, who was cleaning on one side of the deck, overheard the pair’s conversation. Hearing the two, who were like a pair of venomous snakes having a spirited conversation, his heart quickly became anxious to bury Miao Lin in the sea as well.
Yu Ao Qing had hinted twice, but he still pretended to not understand. Either that or he didn’t even hear her. However, he had thickened his face to stalk her, so it was far too hard for people to have goodwill towards him.
The two had talked for a long time and just when Miao Lin became spirited, showing off the prestige of the Sea City’s Miao family, a loud “peng” sound suddenly came from the bottom of the ship and shook the whole ship.
The two standing on the side of the boat, Miao Lin and Yu Ao Qing, had an unstable foothold and almost fell into the sea. However, regardless of how you judged them, the two were still martial artists with naturally extraordinary reflexes and agility; easily, they righted their bodies back up.
It was unknown what Miao Lin was thinking. Maybe he wanted to play the role of the hero rescuing the princess, maybe he wanted to get a good bargain; as soon as he caught his balance, he quickly shouted, “Be careful Senior Sister!”.
While he was shouted, his hand quickly snaked around Yu Ao Qing’s waist for a hug.
Yu Ao Qing was a haughty woman who felt nauseated when Miao Lin was just speaking. How could she stand for Miao Lin hugging her body? As soon as she regained her balance, she immediately moved her body away from Miao Lin’s incoming hand.
In this short amount of time, the boat was suddenly disturbed again.
Yu Ao Qing, who was originally in middle of turning her body, suddenly could not find a foothold. She shot away like a thorn, mouth opened wide, and issuing a short exclamation of shock.
Yet the direction she flew in was actually towards Yang Kai.
Yang Kai was wearing a dirty piece of clothing, holding a stinky and dirty broom while watching the good show. All of a sudden, he was in such a shock that he couldn’t react.
He was standing there to eavesdrop on the two’s conversation for some news; so, how could he have expected that such a dramatic situation to rise up?
Seeing Yu Ao Qing was about to land on his body, in just this critical moment, Yang Kai pretended to slip and fall on his back while also opening a large distance. Almost at the same time he fell, Yu Ao Qing flew over him and heavily fell on the deck. Quite unluckily, the bucket of dirty water beside her spilled all over her head.
The object of many men’s desire and admiration became a drowned chicken in a single instant. All her clothes and hair became wet. As Yu Ao Qing smelled the dirty water that drenched her, she had to quickly suppress the urge to vomit.
Yang Kai was also wailing on the ground, acting out a normal person’s reaction.
If there was a beautiful woman flying over, if you were a normal man, you would naturally stably catch her. You definitely must not let her fall.
However, Yu Ao Qing was not a faithful girl and Miao Lin was not a faithful man. Yang Kai was sure that if he caught Yu Ao Qing just now, he would immediately face the anger of both the man and the woman.
Yu Ao Qing would become angry that her body was touched by a humble servant. Miao Lin would become jealous and filled with killing intent. He knew that it was more than likely he would not be able to see the sun tomorrow.
Hence, avoiding her was the correct choice.
The ship was still shaking. Miao Lin dashed over to Yu Ao Qing’s side, finally finding his chance to get close. He helped her up and worriedly inquired, “Senior Sister, are you ok?”
“Leave!” Yu Ao Qing just couldn’t take it anymore. If this nauseating man didn’t try to touch her, how could she have been thrown around or been doused by the dirty water to the point where her clothes were semi-transparent? She had lost all her face and now her body was emitting a fetid stench.
At this moment, Yu Ao Qing was completely and utterly filled with killing intent.
With her roar, Miao Lin was surprised and retreated two steps.
At this point, from below the cabin came a lot of martial artists. Yu Xiu Ping impressively rushed to the deck to look under the sea. His look quickly changed. “It’s a Monster Beast! All disciples get ready to fight!”
Raising his eyes, he suddenly saw the bedraggled Yu Ao Qing. He called out in a shock. “Qing Er, are you hurt?!”
Yu Ao Qing tightly clenched her teeth, gave Miao Lin a look of extreme resentment, and then slowly shook her head.
“Go back and rest, you don’t need to worry about this situation.” Yu Xiu Ping dully roared.
“En.”
“Senior Sister, I’ll escort you!” Miao Lin naturally wanted to follow.
“No need!” Yu Ao Qing roared out each word. Her beautiful yet dirty figure quickly disappeared from the deck.
On the boat, the miscellaneous ordinary individuals also rapidly evacuated. The Red Cloud Sect’s martial artists, who simply had no say in their life and death, had an abundance of fierceness and a lack of luck.
The sides of the ship were suddenly bombarded with a torrent of waves. The ship began to shake violently again.
Yang Kai quickly got up and followed the ordinary people to the ship’s cabin.
Everyone gathered together, shivering, muttering, praying that the ship would not sink. If the ship sank, outside of the two traveling masters, everyone else would probably become lost at sea.
Yang Kai carefully listened and then gradually relaxed.
He discovered that the Red Cloud Sect’s two masters were not dispatched. This meant that the incoming Monster Beasts weren’t high leveled and Yu Xiu Ping was enough to deal with them.
However, these Monster Beasts were high in quantity and sounds of impacts came from all sides.
The combat lasted for a solid hour before gradually stopping. The attacking Monster Beasts were either dead or repelled. The surroundings were finally peaceful again.
The Red Cloud Sect’s victory caused even the ordinary people to cheer; it was as if they were also victorious
Yang Kai opened his eyes and only felt a burst of sadness.
Not long later, the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples directed the ordinary people onto the deck to clean up the ship. Once these commoners came up and looked around, they quickly became agitated.
On the deck, there was blood everywhere. There were even strange looking fish that had mouths full of fangs. Luckily, they were thoroughly dead.
There were no casualties among the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples. Only a few of those with weaker cultivations were injured and those were no big deal.
Yang Kai cleaned the the decks with the crowd. The blood, dead Monster Beasts, and sweat combined to produce a very foul smell.
Maybe it was because they had already reached the deep parts of the sea, that after the first attack by the Monster Beasts, the Monster Beasts attacked every few days. As time went on, the Monster Beasts grew stronger and stronger.
In order to cope with these Monster Beasts, many of the disabled ordinary people were mercilessly dropped into the sea as bait to attract their attention.
Yu Xiu Ping’s face grew more and more serious as each day passed. Miao Lin also began to frequent the deck. The two faced a divination turtle shell as they attempted to research their route going forward.
After leaving Red Cloud Island for half a month, the boat got lost and Yu Xiu Ping’s anxious mouth had started to blaze. He was in charge of the turtle shell and in charge of leading the way to that island. It could be said that all of the lives on the boat were in his hands. There was still a long ways to go but now he couldn’t divine the correct route.
Feeling impatient, he could no longer treat Miao Lin as calmly as before. Yang Kai often saw him on deck shouting at Miao Lin, closely questioning on all the information that Miao Lin knew. Miao Lin naturally did not dare to conceal anything and pulled out everything he knew as well as the turtle shell.
As the Monster Beasts’ attacks became more frequent and more violent, the Red Cloud Sect’s two masters clashed with the Monster Beasts multiple times. If they didn’t act, the boat would have capsized from the attacks of the Monster Beasts long ago.
Even so, the Red Cloud Sect suffered heavy losses. Of the fifty disciples from the start of the voyage, more than a dozen had died. Less than half of the seventy-some ordinary people remained. The other half were thrown into the sea as bait to distract the Monster Beasts in times of crisis.
On the boat, falling sick was the same as getting abandoned.
Yang Kai could be said to have seen what can be called utterly ruthless actions. However, faced with the ordinary people who did not have the strength to resist and their unceasing cries for help, the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples were throwing people overboard into the mouths Monster Beasts like it was an everyday occurrence, just to buy a very, very small amount of time.
People’s lives here weren’t even worth a mustard seed.
The remaining ordinary people lived their days in fear and constant anxiety.
After another three days, the ship’s crew became more and more scared. The big ship seemed to be going in circles in a region of the sea, and it always failed to find the correct position of the hidden island.
Miao Lin was given several slaps by the angry Yu Xiu Ping and beaten up to the point his entire mouth was full of bloodstains. However, he didn’t dare to have the slightest complaint.
Today, once the night left and the sun rose from the east, Yang Kai who was resting underneath the cabin suddenly heard a cry of surprise from the deck: “Hidden Island, Hidden Island!”.
The cry was tinged with joy and excitement, within an environment saturated with desperation, and was quickly heard by everyone.
*Deng Deng Deng.*
All of the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples sprang into action and headed towards the deck. The ordinary people were infected as well. Yang Kai followed the human river towards the deck and lifted his eyes to hear an infectious cheer among the crowd.
Under the recently risen sun, several hundred zhangs in front of the boat, there was a piece of fantastic, illusory scenery suspended in midair.
It is a paradise-like scene with mountains, rivers, and valleys. There were birds flying in groups in the sky. A ‘ding-dong’ sound came from the mountains and fell in their ears. As far as the eye could see, this beautiful scenery was exceptionally enchanting, with everywhere revealing an untouched and untamed atmosphere.
It was like no one had set foot on the treasured land for thousands of years. There were many rare flowers, a strong breeze, and thriving lush flowers.
Many animals that the crowd could not name appeared before their eyes in a flash. The rush of animals even brought out a bunch of colorful glints.
Sea City’s Mirage Island!
Yang Kai had been fortunate enough to see this beautiful scene before in Sea City. At the moment he laid his eyes on the scene, he naturally recognised it with a glance.
There were rumours that the scenery in Sea City’s Mirage Island were all preserved scenes that, as a result of some special reasons, were converted more than tens of millions of miles away to let the world see.
But seeing the mirage this time compared to the last was somewhat different because it was too real. It was so real that if you could reach out, it would be real as it appeared in their own eyes.
Yu Xiu Ping became quite agitated. With his hands holding the huge turtle shell, he carefully looked and then suddenly laughed: “I understand, I understand! The city right now is the border of the island. No wonder we couldn’t find the entrance. So it was like this!”
The Red Cloud Sect’s two masters became emotional as well. The old master Ding Jia Zi gravely asked: “Xiu Ping, how is the situation now?
The old woman Huo Xiang Lan also looked over with her gaze.
Yu Xiu Ping didn’t dare to be slow. Putting on an excited face, he reverently said: “Responding to the two Uncle Masters, I think we have found the hidden island’s location.”
“Where?” Huo Xiang Lan’s seemingly turbid eyes flashed.
Yu Xiu Ping pointed at the Sea City Mirage Island in front of them: “Right there!”
After he finished speaking, he quickly handed the turtle shell in his hands to the two masters: “Uncle Masters, please lead the way to the vitality on the island. Only with the help of this island, can we open the door to the hidden island!
Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan gave only a glance, as they put the huge turtle shell together, and then started to revolve their vitality to pour ferociously into the turtle shell with no hesitation.
This turtle shell looked ordinary. In reality, on normal days, no matter how the others tested, they could never feel anything exceptional from it. However, the moment Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan poured in their vitality, they were surprised to find the turtle shell turning into a bottomless pit that crazily to devoured their true qi.
In just a short time, the two elderly masters started to shake; their complexions became pale.
“Not good!” Ding Jia Zi exclaimed. He hollered at the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples: “What are you standing there for, hurry up and help me!”
Once the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples heard the command, they quickly headed over and poured their own strength into the turtle shell.
With the help of these people, Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan’s condition stabilized. In a short while, the bland turtle shell suddenly burst out with a ray of rainbows. The turtle shell seemed to sound out a whisper and the road map engraved above came alive, flowing non-stop.
One after another, the disciples were drained of their entire bodys’ strength. They were exhausted to point where they were forced to continuously withdraw.
Only after more than twenty disciples left, did the turtle shell shoot out a magnificent rainbow.
This sudden occurrence made Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan startlingly exclaim at the same time. A group of dense lights from the turtle shell burst out, so they had to retreat.
That turtle shell turned into a streamer, charging straight into the sky.
“Uncle Masters!” Yu Xiu Ping exclaimed. Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan found their footing again and despite their pale faces, shook their hands to indicate they were unharmed.
Everyone looked up and saw the turtle shell fly out several hundred zhangs to coincidentally fall on the mirage. A road of rainbow lights shot out, but this magnificent mirage actually slowly collapsed and disintegrated.
With the disappearance of the mirage, it was as if the intangible barrier blocking everyone’s visions had shattered. When the road of rainbow light shot out, this magnificent Sea City Mirage Floor actually slowly collapsed by itself.
“The Hidden island!” Yu Xiu Ping’s voice trembled.
On board, the ship, the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples, after a moment of silence, suddenly cheered out. They started shouting to vent the excitement in their hearts. The purpose of their trip was to find the hidden island, but they did not expect things to go so smoothly. Although they had also experienced a lot of crises on the way, but the excitement doesn’t come without danger.
Now, the hidden island in the sky in front of their eyes, whose name was world famous, was just around the corner!
The Red Cloud Sect disciples were not only ones who were excited. The ordinary people were excited as well. Which one of them had not heard rumors about the hidden island? Who would have thought they would see it in their lifetimes?
“Set sail! Target, hidden island!” Yu Xiu Ping suppressed the jubilance of the situation and issued a variety of orders in an orderly manner.
However, before the people on the ship even calmed down, uneasy emotions began to rise in everyone’s hearts. The originally calm sea suddenly gave birth to waves and the ship was trapped in a sea of water bubbles. The sea’s surface looked like it was boiling.
“What happened?” Someone asked in a panic.
Ding Jia Zi and Huo Xiang Lan’s dignified look suddenly changed and they exclaimed: “Be careful!”
The sound of their cry was barely heard when the left side of the ship rushed into a wave and tentacle-like things suddenly emerged from the sea. The tentacles were extremely large, up to tens of zhang long, and contained a thunderbolt-like force that directly hit the deck of the ship.
Several of the ordinary people that couldn’t dodge were smashed like clay on the spot.
Accompanied by a loud noise, the deck shattered into pieces that flew in the four directions.
The Red Cloud Sect’s disciples fought back under the protection of the two masters. A variety of martial arts and weapons danced in the sky.
However, no matter the type of attack, the tentacles suffered no damage. Even the two masters didn’t have any methods to harm them.
*Hua ….*
On the other side of the ship, there was a tentacle in the sky that mercilessly smacked down on the stern. The twenty-something zhang long boat’s end rose in the air.
The violent shock meant that everyone lost their balance. Only experts at the True Element stage or above were able to escape into the air. The other warriors and ordinary people who were heading towards their funerals and panickedly fled.
“Remain calm! Everyone remain calm!” Yu Xiu Ping used all of his strength to yell, but just how could he appease the people right now?
*Hua Hua Hua …*
Seven or eight tentacles stretched out from the sea at the same time. They went directly into the ship, dragging the ship into the sea. As the tentacles exerted their gigantic strength, everyone could feel themselves rapidly sinking.
“This is the Island of Monster Beasts!” Ding Jia Zi, seeing this scene, looked aghast. The only part of the power of the Island of Monster Beasts was already beyond his imagination.He simply didn’t have the power to cope with these attacks. He turned to holler at Huo Xiang Lan: “You and I should fight it together to see if there’s a way to make it flee!”
Huo Xiang Lan nodded her head with a serious look on her face. However, before she could begin fighting, she revealed a dumbfounded expression and charged towards Ding Jia Zi exclaiming, “Brother Ding, behind you!”
Ding Jia Zi’s visage looked stunned as he felt the wind of an incoming blow coming from behind him. Immediately, his back was severely injured from the blow. His entire person became like a thunderbolt and he spat out a mouthful of fresh blood as he fell into the sea like a meteorite.
Not even waiting for him to fall into the sea, the tentacle struck out from the sea and accurately rolled him up.
Ding Jia Zi issued a violent scream from his mouth. His body emitted kacha sounds of bones being broken and fractured. He strived to revolve his true qi, but he couldn’t escape the tentacle’s grasp. He extended a hand towards to the fragrant Huo Xiang Lan and sadly shouted, “Sister Lan save me … …”
The Red Cloud Sect’s two masters were sweethearts in their youth, loving each other more than life and death, and eventually married. Later on, it was unknown what changed, but the two were now no longer as close as before, although they still had relations, however they lost the original harmony.
Now face Ding Jia Zi’s plea for help, Huo Xiang Lan was surprised for a moment and then immediately started utilizing her movement skill to head back to the island – she did not turn back at all.
This Monster Beast quickly triumphed over Ding Jia Zi in this short period of time. He naturally did not have any chance of victory.
To save her life, Huo Xiang Lan didn’t dare to tarry any longer. Ding Jia Zi was out of her control. The boat full of Red Cloud Sect’s disciples were doomed as well. The most important thing right now was saving her life.
Ding Jia Zi gave a bitter smile: “Husband and wife are birds from the same forest. When disaster strikes, they fly away separately. Cheap bitch!”
After he spoke, Ding Jia Zi’s body immediately got split into two. All his organs spattered about as his blood exploded all around; leaving only a pair of eyeballs, which fell into the sea.
No one could have imagined that an Antiquity Elder would be killed so violently. Furthermore, the cultivators from the Red Cloud Sect were trying to best this Monster Beast, whose body hadn’t even appeared and seemed to be unkillable.
The joy of the discovery of the Hidden Island had been completely eclipsed and was replaced by fear.
Meanwhile, the ship was towed to the point where half of it entered the land. However, the giant tentacles striking the hull caused the ship to gradually become more tattered.
“What are we supposed to do now?” a cultivator from the Red Cloud Sect cried out while sobbing, thinking to himself, [I’m young! I still have such a future ahead of me! How can I just die like this?]
When that cultivator was done speaking, he quickly got struck down by the stray tentacles throwing about.
This scene was simply Purgatory. It was no different if one were a normal human or a cultivator at this point. As long as you got hit by the tentacle, you were dead.
When those True Element Boundary cultivators saw Huo Xiang Lan escape, they followed suit and quickly tried to escape towards the Hidden Island; ignoring the existence of their fellow disciples on the ship.
Unfortunately, even the True Element Boundary cultivators did not have such an easy time escaping from the Monster Beast’s attack. When they flew up into the air, the tentacles, as if they had eyes, managed to grasp a flying True Element Boundary expert and strangled him to death.
Yang Kai’s expression remained solemn. In just ten breath’s time, starting from when he managed to see the tail of the beast and the tentacles bursting forth, more than half of all the Red Cloud Sect disciples had died, and even more normal humans had perished.
Unfortunately, it was obvious that remaining on the ship was unsafe. Even if one was not going to be hit by the tentacles, they would still eventually sink along with the ship.
So, the only possibility to survive was to jump into the sea; although the chance of living was slim.
Since Yang Kai was not willing to wait for his eventual demise, he hurriedly roared out, “Abandon ship!”
It might initially seem like he warned with good intentions but that was far from the truth. In actuality, his words were meant to disperse the people jumping at sea to disperse the attention of the Monster Beast.
As he had expected, after he had roared, many of the panicked masses seemed to regain their sense of awareness and quickly ran to the side of the ship to jump off without hesitation.
Blood splatters exploded out as they fell but more managed to survive due to their luck. They quickly landed into the water and started to swim towards the island.
Similarly, for Yang Kai, he jumped off as well. Once he made it into the sea, he could see dozens of individuals spread out, heading to different parts of the island.
While Yang Kai was observing his surroundings, he was quick to discover that there was a peculiar occurrence happening right now.
There were people swimming much faster than the rest. It was now easy to tell, who was a cultivator from the Red Cloud Sect. There were many cultivators that could not fly. Nonetheless, if they swam, they would be much quicker than the average normal human. However, it was quite unfortunate that those swimming at the front were being dragged down by the tentacles; disappearing from sight to only leave bubbles on the surface of the water. Meanwhile, those that were obviously normal humans tended to be spared from the attacks.
Yang Kai did not understand how the Sea Monster Beast could tell each person’s position but since there was this strange occurrence happening, he knew that he needed to take advantage of it.
Holding his breath, suppressing the strong palpitation of his heart, while restraining his aura to his utmost limits, Yang Kai acted as a piece of loose wood (Duckweed); allowing the current to push him towards the Hidden Island slowly.
The plan worked as the tentacles seemed to have no interest in him.
But when the plan seemed to be working without any flaw, *Plaat* a loud splash occurred behind him. Yang Kai got caught in shock. He turned his head around to find a paled face Red Cloud Sect martial artist swimming towards him.
Noticing that he was creating too much unnecessary sounds as he swam, Yang Kai cursed.
The Red Cloud Sect cultivator quickly managed to reach Yang Kai’s side. Without taking a look at the person beside him, he grabbed onto Yang Kai’s shoulder in an attempt to propel himself forward.
It was at this moment that the tentacle was approaching directly behind them.
Both Yang Kai and the Red Cloud Sect cultivator both noticed the approaching crisis. However, the Red Cloud Sect cultivator was smart. He took advantage of Yang Kai. Increasing his grip on Yang Kai’s shoulders, he attempted to throw the boy towards the tentacles.
Unfortunately for him, before he could attempt such an act, Yang Kai focused his Yuan Qi and sank down. Transforming his hand into a fist, Yang Kai punched the Red Cloud Sect cultivator’s shoulders, forcing him back.
“You!” the Red Cloud Sect cultivator exclaimed with amazement. With the clothes Yang Kai was wearing, it was obvious that he was supposed to be one of those normal humans on the ship. He would have never expected that someone in that uniform would be a cultivator.
Without enough time to react, the tentacle burst forth from the sea. The tentacle easily got grasped onto the cultivator and with a miserable scream of pain, his whole body was crushed into pieces. Each fragment of his bones pierced his organs, causing him to die a quick and violent death.
Yang Kai did not dare make any movement. Staring at the tentacle in mid-air, his eyes narrowed.
Very shortly after, the tentacle gradually returned from whence it came and sank back into the sea; vanishing from sight.
[My choice seemed to be the best course of action. Holding my breath and remaining motionless seemed to be much better than fanatically swimming.]
After waiting for a short moment to see if the tentacle had returned, Yang Kai proceeded to very slowly swim away.
The distance between the Hidden Island to the steamship was not exactly near nor could it be described as far. It seemed to be 5km from the crash site of the ship. A distance that would not take an entire life’s journey to travel through so, even ordinary people could manage to swim to shore. Of course, there were no tentacles attacking that site.
It took an hour for Yang Kai to manage to swim to the Hidden Island. When his feet first made contact with the dry sand on the shore, Yang Kai collapsed and lay on the ground. He looked up at the blue sky, allowing his lingering fear to slowly dissipate.
In an hour’s time, his heart still had a welling fear lingering inside. He was truly frightened that moment where the tentacle was encroaching on him from behind. He was afraid of what might have happened if the tentacle had grabbed onto him instead.
It was only fortunate he had found a way to cope with the tentacle. It was fortunate that it did not attack him from the start…
While he was escaping, he had no time to sense the surroundings. After waiting for his breathing calm down, he could finally hear some light panting close by.
[This voice… it’s from a girl.] When Yang Kai turned his head to check who she was, he cursed his luck.
Just about 10 meters away, was Yu Ao Qing from the Red Cloud Sect. She was partly kneeling on the ground. With her soaked clothes sticking onto her skin, it exposing her abundant waist, breasts and perky round bottom. Accompanied with her slender legs, fully visible for the eyes to feast upon, it was provoking a man’s desires.
She seemed exceptionally pitiful, with her wet hair laying on her shoulders, and that beautiful face that became pale, it was obvious that she had just exited from the waters.
However, no matter her beauty, Yang Kai was already aware of her vicious and evil nature. She had used her looks to get information out of Miao Lin. This viper, after receiving what she wanted, she tossed him into the sea. Although it was cruel, Yang Kai was also looking forward to Miao Lin’s death.
Not willing to have anything to do with her, Yang Kai quietly snuck past her, deeper into the island.
“Stop!” Yu Ao Qing managed to spot Yang Kai and shouted.
Yang Kai did not really want anything to do with her. So, he continued to proceed.
“I said stop didn’t I? Are you deaf?!” Yu Ao Qing angrily got up from the ground and hastily got in front of Yang Kai.
Yang Kai’s expression remained indifferent.
When he was on the steamship, he was extremely cautious. However, right now, this was not the case. Although Yu Ao Qing is in the Separation and Reunion Stage, one stage above Yang Kai, he was confident that if he could not beat her, he could at least run away.
Meanwhile, Yu Ao Qing was curiously analyzing Yang Kai. She expected that from his status as an ordinary human, who was tasked odd jobs on the ship, he would fear her presence. However, this was not the case, especially with the calm face he displayed.
[You are so arrogant! You look only 15-16 years old!] Yu Ao Qing sneered. With one revolution of her Yuan Qi, the moisture in her clothes evaporated. Restoring her back to her arrogant self, she opened her mouth to speak. “Tell me. Have you seen anyone else around here?”
“No.” Yang Kai said with his brows wrinkled.
“?”
“Actually, there is one.”
“Where?”
“You!”
Yu Ao Qing took a deep breath. Her perky breast swayed up and down, seemingly bursting out of her clothes as she warned, “It’s best that you act smarter. Otherwise, do not blame me for being impolite!”
Yang Kai’s face distorts, showing the displeasure he had within his heart.
[This is a good opportunity to get rid of her. After all, we just crashed onto the island. Where else would I get this chance?]
However, before he could do anything, a voice rang out. “Sister Qing! You are alright!”
After hearing his voice, Yang Kai’s expression immediately became strange. Out of everyone, it had to be his enemy, Miao Lin that landed close to his shore. Furthermore, he must have landed here for some time since he came dashing out from the group of palm trees.
Unfortunately, it was not only Miao Lin. There was also another female disciple.
Since there were three Red Cloud Sect disciples, something that Yang Kai could not deal with all on his own, he restrained himself.
“How has he not drowned to death?!” Yu Ao Qing scolded in a soft voice while clenching her teeth. It was obvious that she was not prepared to meet this annoying fly on this island.
“A bad person does not die. He will live to suffer for a thousand years,” Yang Kai whispered.
Yu Ao Qing coldly stared at him with an unexpected smile of approval.
Miao Lin quickly rushed to Yu Ao Qing with joy. “Sister Qing. It’s really good to see you again.”
Yu Ao Qing gave a slight nod that was filled with arrogance. Her vision shifted focus to the area behind of Miao Lin as he asked, “Are you the only people here?”
Miao Lin quickly replied, “*En!* I came first. After I was Sister Zhang Yu. No one else has landed here since.
The Red Cloud Sect female disciple called Zhang Yu walked over to the other two. Now, the group had four people. Since Yang Kai was still disguised as an ordinary human, he could not help but worry.
Yu Ao Qing gathered her beautiful hair and placed in on her back while she looked back towards the sea and sighed.
Yang Kai also looked back and discovered that the steamship a few kilometers away was in tatters. Most of it had been broken into planks. Meanwhile, the sea around it was dyed in red with many floating bits of flesh around. Sharks all around were swarming the area, having a feast. This scene is simply a living hell.
“Can we go back…?” Yu Ao Qing murmured.
Thinking they had found the Hidden Island, the Red Cloud Sect thought their name was destined to resound throughout the world, but they didn’t count on their ship being sunk. Now, even if they had survived, landed on the island and found its treasures, how could they get back?
Without a strong ship, even if they were Immortal Ascension Boundary masters, they would never be able to fly across this nearly ten thousand mile expanse.
A faint melancholy filled the hearts of the three Red Cloud Sect disciples. These three were young and had not encountered any great hardships before, but just earlier this day when the aquatic Monster Beast had attacked, they witnessed the deaths of many of their elders, making human lives seem as fragile as ants. If they had been unlucky, they would now be with those people, corpses in the belly of beasts and fish. Fortunately they had escaped with their lives, but now they were trapped on this island, with no way of returning home, naturally, they were depressed.
“Do not worry Senior Sister Qing, Junior Brother will definitely find a way to bring you home.” Miao Lin was well versed in wooing a girl; although he was panicking inside, he still managed to put on a great show, quickly saying some comforting words.
Yu Ao Qing was not in a good mood, and listening to him boast so flippantly, she couldn’t help but sneer: “Oh, you have the ability to build a ship, fight off that Monster Beast, and bring me away from here?”
“Well, no…” being questioned Miao Lin, suddenly looked awkward.
“Can you soar thousands of miles through the sky?” Yu Ao Qing asked even more forcefully.
“Uh… er… um…”
“Then just shut your mouth!” Yu Ao Qing vented out all the anger she had built up these days on the ship, and if they were not facing such difficult circumstances, she would probably have directly beaten him.
Zhang Yu hurriedly said: “Senior Sister Qing do not be angry, Miao Lin was just trying to comfort us.”
“Humph!” Yu Ao Qing swung her hair and turned towards the beach, after walking a few steps she coldly scowled: “trying to be a hero with no real ability, don’t be so presumptuous!”
Zhang Yu hurried to keep up.
Miao Lin had kindly tried to comfort her, but Yu Ao Qing responded by spearing him with criticism, his face had was somewhat ugly as he cursed under his breath. His eyes flashing a touch of bitterness, he then turned and looked at Yang Kai, murderous intent surging, he seemed to have found a target to vent his embarrassment on.
“Take him with us!” Yu Ao Qing’s cold words came in front.
Miao Lin grunted, bitterly staring at Yang Kai, he then pushed him to keep up.
The four walked along the beach in one direction, although Yu Ao Qing did not say anything, Yang Kai knew she was looking for others from the Red Cloud Sect that were scattered during their escape.
This is undoubtedly the right approach. Right now they were alone, with no elders to protect them, of course, the first thing to do was find more allies.
But after a whole day on the beach, they could only find four more people, and only two of them were Red Cloud Sect disciples; the other two were actually ordinary people, they had no clue where everyone else had gone.
The team had grown to eight, but the overall strength did not increase much as they were still only five Red Cloud Sect cultivators, of whom, all were younger generation disciples.
The two Red Cloud Sect disciples they had finally found were a male and a female. The male was called Qi Yuan, the female called Luo Qian Qian, and their strengths were not high, probably only between peak Qi Transformation and initial Separation and Reunion Boundary.
Unable to find any of the elders, Yu Ao Qing’s expression became bitter, her strength, amongst the five Red Cloud Sect disciples was the highest, having a cultivation level of the Separation and Reunion Boundary Sixth Stage, everyone else was not as strong as her. Furthermore, in the Sect she held a high status, people naturally looked up to her, placing their expectations on her to lead them. The burden on her shoulders made her feel at a loss.
At night, the three ordinary people were ordered by the Red Cloud Sect’s disciples to pick up some firewood and raise a bonfire on the beach. Crowding together, they began to discuss what to do next.
Some proposed they search for the elders, while others wanted to stay here and wait to be found, they were unable to come to an agreement.
Eventually, Yu Ao Qing spoke out, “Since we’ve come to Hidden Island, we can’t waste this opportunity, tomorrow we’ll head into the island to explore, hopefully we can find the elders, and even if we can’t, if we gain some opportunity here maybe we can find a way to leave this place and return to the Sect.”
Everyone felt that what Yu Ao Qing said was rational, and Hidden Island’s treasures and opportunities were also their whole reason for being here in the first place.
Yang Kai waited for them to finish discussing, and then submissively said, “Great Young Masters, if you head into the island, then, can you leave us here? We are just seaside fishermen, in case there is some danger we will be no help, and will only become a burden…”
The other two ordinary people had similar thoughts, but did not have the courage to speak up like Yang Kai, instead, silently glancing towards Yu Ao Qing.
They knew that the decision was ultimately in her hands.
Zhang Yu wrinkled her brow, and then nodded her head saying: “Alright, traveling with you really would be cumbersome.”
Originally she thought that Yu Ao Qing would agree to leave these three ordinary people here, but surprisingly, after a moment Yu Ao Qing shook her head, smiled and said: “You were brought here by my Red Cloud Sect, if we leave you here, you might still encounter some danger, it is better for you to follow us, that way your chance to live will be greater.”
[Damn slut!] Yang Kai cursed. How could he not know what Yu Ao Qing was planning? Her face was beautiful, but this vicious cunning snake was obviously not some simple, kind woman.
Although he thought so inside, he still had to offer a flattering act of gratitude towards her. He was afraid that he would have to spend the rest of his days sticking together with these Red Cloud Sect disciples.
While Yang Kai was annoyed in his heart, this arrangement was also not inconsistent with his plans. He did not have any understanding of this island; following these disciples around to explore might not be a bad idea.
If they really encountered any danger, couldn’t he just find the opportunity to escape?
Night fell and the five Red Cloud Sect disciples took turns at watch.
The next day, a line of eight people entered Hidden Island to explore.
Once they entered the island, Yu Ao Qing revealed her real purpose in bringing along the ordinary people, forcing one of them to walk in the front while everyone else followed behind.
Although this person was terrified, under threat from Yu Ao Qing’s, he really had no choice.
Everyone now finally understood why Yu Ao Qing insisted on bringing these ordinary people, using them as disposable pathfinders.
Traveling for a long time, deeper and deeper into the island, they were surrounded by towering old trees, swaying endlessly in the wind, crackling sounds stimulating their fears, the ordinary person walking in front was frightened stiff, his legs buckled, kneeling down on the ground, he kept begging for mercy.
The Red Cloud Sect disciples ignored his pleas, constantly threatening him to keep moving, eventually, he could only muster up his courage to walk forward again.
Around noon, a row of fruit trees suddenly appeared in front of them. Hanging from the branches were numerous alluring red fruits, no one knew exactly what these fruits were, but the smell was quite tempting.
Their group was all tired and hungry, so when they saw so many fruits, naturally their appetites were stimulated, involuntarily swallowing their saliva.
Luo Qian Qian reached out her hand and picked one. Just as she was about to taste it, Yu Ao Qing suddenly shouted: “Wait!”
Luo Qian Qian suddenly paused; puzzled, she looked towards her wondering: “What’s wrong?”
Yu Ao Qing didn’t explain, instead of taking the fruit and then turned towards the three ordinary people.
Seeing that look, everyone knew what she was planning.
Unsure if this fruit was toxic, the fastest way to find out was to let someone try it. The two ordinary people suddenly became panicked, and not wanting to expose himself, Yang Kai also pretended to do so.
Yu Ao Qing’s eyes landed on Yang Kai, walking up to him and thrusting the fruit into his hand she ordered: “Eat it.”
Yang Kai desperately held down his raging urges to attack, and looked down at the fruit in his hand, sniffing it. Intuitively, he felt that there was no poison inside, but under the myriad of objects created by heaven, it was impossible to tell unless one another had a taste of it.
“Eat it, it’s not poisonous,” Old Demon ‘s suddenly said. “This little bitch is really not a good thing.”
“You know what this fruit is?” Yang Kai quickly asked.
“En.”
If Old Demon hadn’t spoken just now, Yang Kai might have exposed his identity and caused a scene, but since Old Demon said it wasn’t poisonous, instead he could just simply eat it, he was hungry anyway.
Calm on the inside, his face still appeared hesitant; looking at the fruit in his hand like it was a deadly poison. Yu Ao Qing repeated her order and Yang Kai ‘reluctantly’ ate a mouthful.
A delicate flavour, sweet like honey, like a ripe persimmon but a bit chewier.
“Eat more.” Yu Ao Qing coldly spoke.
“Old Demon, if I can kill this woman, you must give her spirit some severe torture.” Yang Kai ruthlessly ordered.
“Old Servant will obey!” Old Demon laughed maliciously.
After Yang Kai had eaten the whole fruit, the other seven people still didn’t move, all staring helplessly at his reaction.
After waiting half an hour, seeing that Yang Kai was still alright, Yu Ao Qing was involuntarily relieved, waving her hand she said: “Everyone eat! We’ll rest here for a moment and then set off again.”
Miao Lin and Qi Yuan quickly went and picked the fruit, the three Red Cloud female disciples resting by the side. After just a few breaths, Miao Lin and Qi Yuan brought a lot of fruit over, graciously handing them to the three women.
Miao Lin didn’t hesitate to praise: “Senior Sister Qing is so thoughtful, if weren’t for you, I’m afraid it wouldn’t be more than few days and we’d be poisoned dead.”
Zhang Yu also said: “Yes, I have long ago heard about Senior Sister Qing’s extraordinary intelligence. Today’s events prove your reputation is well deserved.”
Hearing so many people openly praise her, Yu Ao Qing cold face finally showed a slight smile.
While the five Red Cloud Sect disciples ate, Yang Kai and the other two ordinary people weren’t idle, stuffing their mouths with fruit.
This row of fruit trees had a lot of fruit, but with eight people picking and eating, it took no time before the trees became naked.
Satiated, the eight people once again set out. Perhaps because Yang Kai had taste tested the fruit and had borne a lot of risk, this time leading the way was still not him but the other ordinary person.
Shortly after, Qi Yuan suddenly pointed to the side: “Look, something’s flashing over there!”
Everyone looked towards the direction he pointed. Indeed there was something glittering in the grass.
“Let’s go take a look.” Yu Ao Qing said.
Soon, everyone had approached to about three hundred feet from the flashing light. Yu Ao Qing’s cautious nature was displayed again, forcing an ordinary person forward to test the waters while still remaining in place.
With his life firmly grasped in the hands of another, this ordinary person had to succumb to Yu Ao Qing’s orders, trembling as he walked over to look, he spoke, “Young Masters, this is nothing more than a small grass.”
Listening to what he said, the five Red Cloud Sect disciples’ interest was piqued, Zhang Yu hurriedly asked, “What kind of grass?”
“It’s a beautiful snow white colour, very pretty.” The man replied and asked again, “Do you want me to bring it back?”
“Don’t touch it!” Yu Ao Qing yelled. She then led the Red Cloud disciple forward; Yang Kai also kept up. As they approached, the five Red Cloud disciples let out an involuntary sigh of praise.
It was indeed a snow white grass, like a beautiful eye-catching jade, appearing crystal clear; one could even vaguely see a fluorescent liquid, flowing in its veins.
“Heavens!” Zhang Yu exclaimed, “It’s a Snow White Jade Skin Bone Grass!”
Yu Ao Qing flashed a smile, “Sure enough, it’s an Earth Grade Low-Rank spirit grass!”
Luo Qian Qian was also quite excited, while Qi Yuan and Miao Lin were fairly calm.
The reason being, this Snow White Jade Skin Bone Grass was a spirit grass mainly for young women to use. Yang Kai had also previously obtained one on the Red Cloud Island, the Beautiful Woman Pistil. If a woman were to consume the Beautiful Woman Pistil, it would cause her to appear a little more beautiful. But, if she were to consume the Snow White Jade Skin Bone Grass, her skin would become radiant and clear, white like snow and delicate like a newborn baby.
If the two were used together, it could make an ugly woman be reborn as a beauty.
Women crave beauty. Of these three women, which one would not want to become more beautiful? Seeing this Snow White Jade Skin Bone Grass, naturally, they were overjoyed.
“We’ve barely started exploring this island and already obtained a treasure, it seems that this trip will yield a big harvest.” Miao Lin looked quite excited.
Yu Ao Qing was not polite, directly bending over and plucking this Snow White Jade Skin Bone Grass. She then removed a jade box and carefully stored it.
Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian both hesitated, but eventually just watched.
Yu Ao Qing laughed, “When we return to the Sect, I’ll get the Alchemists from the Pill Hall to refine this into some dans, so that two Junior Sisters will also receive its benefits.”
She also knew that now was not a suitable time for her usual arrogance, so she openly tried to appease them.
Sure enough, Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian smiled, “Thank you Senior Sister Qing. When it’s time to go to the Pill Hall to refine it, Senior Sister Qing must come forward personally to say a few words.”
Obtaining an Earth Grade Low-Rank spirit grass, the Red Cloud disciples’ previous worries and anxieties were swept away. The lingering fear and uneasy in their hearts gradually dissipated, instead replaced with a relaxed joyful mood.
It was as if they hadn’t been stranded here, but had simply come to hunt for treasure.
Of course, this Hidden Island had been isolated for so long, who knew how many precious treasures it held. In just two days of exploring, everyone had harvested a great deal, collecting more than a dozen rare herbs, all of them Earth Grade Mid-Rank and above, they had even found one or two Heaven Grade herbs.
With this harvest, the five Red Cloud disciples became even more excited.
This day, as they were walking, a faint fog suddenly appeared in front of them, covering the group’s view.
The fog was strange, and the ordinary man who was in the lead hesitated, turning to Yu Ao Qing with some fear in his eyes.
“Keep moving!” Yu Ao Qing ordered, her cold beautiful face had a ruthless expression.
The man was helpless, he had to go forward.
But just as his body entered the fog, suddenly a burst of hissing sounds could be heard, soon followed by a tragic cry, and shortly after that ordinary man collapsed directly on the ground, constantly twitching.
Everyone paled, quickly falling back, staring in horror at the changes of the man.
It was as if he had been thrown into a pan of hot oil, almost like he was being melted by a flame, waves of white gas constantly evaporating from him, his flesh falling from his bones onto the ground, forming a red bloody pool of liquid.
After only five breaths, this once living person had lost all his flesh and blood, turning into a pile of dry bones lying on the ground.
The air was filled with an unspeakable taste.
*Vomit …* Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian paled, their bodies bent over to vomit, and although Miao Lin and Qi Yuan were better, it was not by much.
Yu Ao Qing’s long eyelashes quivered, the blood suddenly draining from her face, becoming extremely pale. Although she was frightened, at least it wasn’t as bad as Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian.
The ordinary man who stood next to Yang Kai had long ago collapsed to the ground.
Of the people present, only Yang Kai remained calm. Even so, a chill still rose from the soles of the feet.
Just now, if it had been him who was forced forward, his end would not have been any different.
But then again, if Yu Ao Qing had really ordered him, Yang Kai would not have taken the risk.
“It’s a poison fog!” Yu Ao Qing stiffly turned, skimming the group, trying to portray composure, but still trembling, “Everyone get back!”
Having just witnessed such a terrible scene, naturally, everyone could not wait to leave here and immediately kept up with Yu Ao Qing.
After backtracking several miles, everyone finally relaxed.
Having just escaped, the Red Cloud disciples looked towards Yu Ao Qing full of gratitude. If not for her caution, the fate of that man in the fog, might have been their own.
In hindsight, they strongly admired Yu Ao Qing’s decision before to bring these ordinary people to lead the way.
Yang Kai also understood now that he had to look for an opportunity to leave. Or else the next time they encountered some unknown danger, he would inevitably be pushed forward by Yu Ao Qing as a sacrifice. If he stayed with this group of people, sooner or later he would be killed by this bitch.
Now he just needed an opportunity, some kind of distraction where nobody would have time to take care of him!
While the group was resting, a burst of noise suddenly came. Yang Kai frowned, a foreboding feeling enveloping him.
“What was that?” Miao Lin panicked, jumping to his feet.
“What sound?” Qi Yuan asked as he leaned over to listen.
“Quiet! Stop talking and listen carefully!” Yu Ao Qing obviously also heard something.
The group held their breath, only to hear a buzzing sound coming from all around them. It sounded like the buzzing of bees, but it was obviously too noisy for a swarm to create.
The buzzing was quickly closing in, not only that, there was also a rumbling coming from under their feet; numerous cracks quickly formed. It was as if there was something underground quickly tunneling towards them.
“Damn it, run!” Yu Ao Qing’s face sank, calling out, running in the opposite direction.
The other Red Cloud disciples quickly chased after her, and although Yang Kai was looking for an opportunity to slip away, he also didn’t want to prematurely expose himself, not to mention, he knew nothing about the current enemies so naturally, he would use the Red Cloud disciples to probe them.
The group moved fast after hearing Yu Ao Qing’s order, fleeing with all their might. But they had not run more than a few steps when behind them a scream was heard.
When they all glanced back, what they saw nearly caused their souls to fly out.
The last ordinary person had been surrounded by a group of bowl sized, strange looking black insects. He cried out in terror, his clothes shredded, flesh ripped apart; it took only a breath before he fell to the ground.
Everyone couldn’t believe their eyes. Although they didn’t know what these insects were, the fear of the unknown, followed by their brutal disposition left them panic-stricken.
Seeing how terrifying these insects were, the five Red Cloud disciples ran even faster, no one paying attention to Yang Kai, not knowing if they could escape, who would care about him?
Only running a short distance, Yu Ao Qing suddenly paused, the people catching up from behind quickly asked, “What’s wrong?”
“They’re also in front of us! We’re surrounded!” Yu Ao Qing paled.
Everyone focused ahead, and sure enough they could hear buzzing sounds in front, and an overwhelming number of black insects were flying toward them.
“Fight!” Yu Ao Qing acted decisively.
The Red Cloud Sect disciples quickly brought out their weapons, as they slaughtered into the swarm.
There were a huge number of these insects, but their level should be quite low. The five mutually supported each other, and after rushing inside for a while, they had managed to cut down quite a few of these bugs.
Seeing that there was hope, they fought even more vigorously.
Yang Kai stuck close behind them; perhaps because the Red Cloud disciples’ attacks attracted the attention of the swarm, he was actually safe and sound. The insects obviously didn’t consider him a threat.
“Old Demon, what the hell are these things?” Yang Kai asked as he watched from the side.
“Old Servant does not know.”
“You have no idea?” Yang Kai was speechless.
Old Demon helplessly replied, “Please forgive me, young master, this old one has lived so long but is still ignorant…”
[This old fart, in this life or death situation he’s still so damn talkative!]
Right then, Yang Kai suddenly saw Qi Yuan reach out and grab his collar, trying to throw him out.
There were too many insects coming from one side. Unable to cope with them, he wanted to use Yang Kai as a shield to buy time.
Yang Kai’s face darkened, knowing he couldn’t hide anymore, his hand shot up, grabbing Qi Yuan’s arm, he lets out a burst of strength and hit Qi Yuan. Currently being stunned from the attack Qi Yuan dropped to the ground. Taking the opportunity, Yang Kai twisted his waist and threw him into the insect swarm.
“Ah…” Qi Yuan looked stunned. Not figuring out how he had been thrown, the next moment his body was wrapped in insects, raising a piercing scream.
“Qi Yuan!” Zhang Yu shouted in horror, immediately staring coldly toward Yang Kai.
Yang Kai sneered, releasing a sudden burst of Yuan Qi, a bright aura radiated from his body, giving him the appearance of a burning fireball.
The four remaining Red Cloud disciples were stunned by this rapid development. They had not expected that the ordinary person they had ordered around for the past several days would have such a sudden change.
Ignoring the stunned Red Cloud disciples, Yang Kai dashed towards where he had thrown Qi Yuan, to clear a path for himself.
The insects quickly surrounded him, but their small wings were vulnerable to his True Yang Yuan Qi, quickly being singed. Without their wings they fell like fat dumplings, and could no longer touch Yang Kai’s body.
The four Red Cloud disciples watched Yang Kai wrapped in a fiery Yuan Qi, blaze a path while dashing away.
“Wha…” Miao Lin’s jaw dropped, too shocked to speak.
“Don’t get distracted, keep fighting!” Yu Ao Qing said, bitterly staring at Yang Kai’s back, clenching her teeth till they nearly broke.
[That guy obviously wasn’t an ordinary person; he was clearly a cultivator who was hiding his strength!]
Yang Kai had also thought that these insects would be difficult to deal with, but once he had fought them he realized otherwise.
Perhaps for Yu Ao Qing and the Red Cloud Sect disciples it was a challenge, but for him it was extremely easy.
The wings of these insects were fragile, their order was also low, a single attack, or simply brushing past them, was enough for his Pure Yang Yuan Qi to burn their wings.
Without their ability to fly, they simply weren’t a threat to Yang Kai.
Their only advantages were their numbers, and their burrowing ability, which made their movements difficult to predict, often launching surprise attacks on Yang Kai from below.
Executing his movement skill, Yang Kai soon dashed out of the insects’ encirclement, sprinting forward a few miles, only to suddenly stop again.
In front of him appeared a wall of mist. It was the same poison fog that had melted the first ordinary person!
[What happened? Did I run back?] Yang Kai was uncertain, quickly running along the edge of the fog, hoping to find a path out.
But half an hour later, when a pile of bones appeared in front of Yang Kai, his face couldn’t help but sink.
These bleached bones were from that first ordinary person.
Not slowing his pace, after a while, Yang Kai’s expression became gloomy.
Not far in front of him, there was a corpse, but this one looked like it had been gnawed beyond recognition, but the clothing scraps left behind were all too familiar to Yang Kai, it was a Red Cloud Sect disciple’s robe.
And from the weapon lying nearby the corpse’s identity was obvious; it was the disciple he had earlier thrown to his death, Qi Yuan!
[I had been running in a giant circle this whole time!] It was over ten miles in circumference, and it was all completely surrounded in poisonous fog.
It wasn’t until now that Yang Kai finally understood how difficult these insects were to deal with. They were indeed vulnerable to his Yang Qi, but they had a special ability to release this highly toxic gas, allowing them to seal off such a large area.
Unless you could break through this fog, you simply could not leave.
[Can I withstand the erosion of this fog?] Yang Kai’s brow wrinkled. After considering for a long time, he decided it was worth a test.
Standing at the edge of the fog, with a solemn expression, he slowly held out his hand, his True Yang Secret Art pushed to the limit, even using Golden Skeleton.
His had just barely touched the fog when he jumped back, fast as lightning.
A stabbing pain came from the fingertips, looking down, his face sank.
His fingertips were bloody and showed signs of melting, the pain radiated to the roots of all his nerves, Yang Kai decisively cut off those pieces of flesh.
Tearing his clothes, he wrapped the wound, took a deep breath, and looked around.
[I had just separated from Yu Ao Qing around here, but where were they now? The fog had surrounded them, no one could escape, but since there were no other bodies here, where did they go?]
*Buzzzz …*
Countless insects seemed to have smelled blood, and approached again.
Yang Kai’s face sank, True Yang Yuan Qi burst out smashing into the surrounding insects.
Just like before, these insect’s wings were burnt off, grounding them, but their numbers didn’t decrease at all, instead growing with every passing moment, God knows how many of them there were, it was overwhelming, seemingly endless.
While Yang Kai could deal with these insects flying around him like swatting flies, he couldn’t help feeling anxious. After all, he still didn’t have any idea how to escape this dozen or so mile trap.
Although he had stored a lot of Yang Liquid in his Dantian, enough to support this wanton slaughter, his physical strength had its limit, if that gave out, even if there was more Yang Liquid he would still be helpless.
“Young Master, this group of insect Monstrous Beasts should have a leader, similar to regular bees,” said Old Demon at the crucial moment.
“What are you trying to say,” Yang Kai quickly asked.
“This old servant is saying that, if you can kill the insect king, you should be able to escape from here.”
“Do you know where the king is then?”
“Ke…ke… old servant doesn’t know…”
Yang Kai wasn’t in the mood to blame Old Demon for talking nonsense, but he did think of a possibility.
Perhaps, the reason for these insects’ siege wasn’t to kill him, but to hunt!
The fact that he had lost track of Yu Ao Qing around here, but there were no other corpses was the best proof that these Red Cloud Sect disciples were most likely captured by these insects and taken somewhere.
And that place, should be the insects’ nest!
Similar to with bees, there were workers who collected honey, bringing it back for the queen to enjoy. Wasn’t it possible to interpret the behavior of these insects as collecting “honey”?
(Pew: I object to the scientific inaccuracy of this statement! ‘there were workers who collected honey’)
(Faux: I agree)
The more he thought about it, the more certain he became, leading him to slowly come up with a daring plan.
Carefully considering that the success rate of this plan was high, Yang Kai received back his True Yang Yuan Qi. He took a deep breath and bravely confronted these insects.
Once Yang Kai no longer resisted, the insects stopped attacking, instead hovering around him, layer upon layer.
“What are you doing?” Old Demon asked in shock.
“Testing my theory!” Yang Kai said calmly. With nowhere to escape these insects, the outside still surrounded by the fog barrier, sooner or later his strength would give out and he would end up dead, might as well take a chance now while preserving his strength.
If his guess was right, there was a chance of survival.
After a tense moment of confrontation, dozens of insects suddenly left the swarm and flew over to Yang Kai.
Old Demon shouted, “Young Master, you can’t just sit still!”
“Shut up!” Yang Kai did not have time to listen to his shouting, instead focusing on the dozens of insects rushing over, his whole body tensed, like a fully drawn bowstring, ready to strike as soon as anything went wrong.
But to his great relief, the insects which flew to him, did not attack, instead they began dragging him, pushing and shoving him towards a specific direction.
[Sure enough!] Yang Kai burst into a big grin.
With this, he could explain why Yu Ao Qing and the other Red Cloud Sect disciples’ bodies weren’t here. Obviously these people also fought until they were exhausted, and were then caught by these insects.
The surrounding scene of tens of thousands of insects was a bit terrifying, but Yang Kai remained indifferent; staring towards the direction these bugs were pushing him.
Not long after, a pit appeared in front of him.
Inside this big pit was a dark cave, like the mouth of a great beast, grim and foreboding.
At the entrance to the cave, Yang Kai saw a tattered skirt. Recognizing the colour and material, he was certain it was Yu Ao Qing’s.
They really were caught.
The speculation he held had been confirmed, Yang Kai knew now he had nothing to worry about, not waiting for those insects, he jumped directly into the cave.
A foul and unpleasant stench blew from inside the cave’s nine paths and eighteen bends, all of which had been dug up by these insects, nothing like the Heaven’s Cave.
As Yang Kai walked, he carefully remembered his path, secretly leaving some road marks behind.
In the corridor, from time to time he could see many insects scurrying about, and these insects weren’t just bowl sized. There seemed to be many types of insects, some were nearly as big as a person, while some were the size of a large wash basin, others the size of a bucket, it all looked quite frightening.
[Fuck, taken prisoner by a bunch of bugs! Just wait till I find your king, I’ll definitely make you regret this!] Yang Kai seethed with anger.
Captured by these insects, Yang Kai was forced down the corridors for a long time, eventually arriving at a fairly large room.
Calling this place a hole wasn’t an exaggeration; however, it seemed like it was actually a food storage for this swarm, because when Yang Kai looked around, there were already a few Red Cloud Sect disciples inside, all of them distressed.
A number of eyes stared towards Yang Kai, and he could hear a burst of malicious laughter, filled with mockery coming from Miao Lin.
All the Red Cloud Sect disciples had suffered some minor injuries, and were sitting sluggishly on the ground, directing a hateful look towards Yang Kai.
The insects left Yang Kai here, but at the entrance to the hole, there were several bigger-than-people sized insects on guard, apparently to prevent these people from escaping.
Once inside, Yang Kai did not bother talking to the Red Cloud Sect disciples, instead finding a remote corner and sitting down cross-legged.
Yu Ao Qing stared at Yang Kai coldly. Seeing him sit down, close his eyes, and not speak a word, she couldn’t help but ask, “Who are you!?”
Yang Kai briefly opened his eyes, then again ignored her.
“Why would you sneak onto my Red Cloud Sect’s ship, while hiding your strength? Going so far as to hide only till this point?” Yu Ao Qing asked again.
Yang Kai disdained to look at her, and slowly spoke, “First, it’s not like I wanted to mix into your ship, you Red Cloud Sect people brought me over. Second, if I did not hide my strength, would I have been able to live up till now? Third, I acted this way to survive. Damn woman, what face do you have to question me? If it weren’t for your Red Cloud Sect kidnapping people all over the place, how could I possibly be here?
“You dare talk to me like this!” Yu Ao Qing frowned.
“Why won’t I? Who the hell do you think you are?” Yang Kai sneered.
“Senior Sister Qing, don’t bullshit with him, he just killed Senior Brother Qi Yuan!” Miao Lin stared bitterly at Yang Kai, “We want revenge for Senior Brother Qi!”
“Hah!” Yang Kai laughed.
“What are you laughing at?” Miao Lin grit his teeth as he scowled at Yang Kai. “Do you not know how to write the word ‘dead’?”
“Idiot!” Yang Kai looked at him full of contempt. “When I was on the ship doing chores, I heard this slut and your Elder Yu say, after they had found this island, they were going to drown you into the Endless Sea. It’s too ridiculous you had no idea!”
Yu Ao Qing revealed a look of panic and shouted, “I never said that!”
She then glanced towards Miao Lin, quickly explaining, “Don’t listen to his nonsense!”
Miao Lin looked at Yang Kai and said, “Do you think your petty words, slandering Senior Sister Qing, will convince me? You don’t have to explain, I know Senior Sister would never do that.”
Yu Ao Qing nodded her head.
“Whether she said it or not, she knows the truth.”
Yang Kai expression became cold, watching Yu Ao Qing he said, “You better not attack me, or you’ll disturb those insects! “
Yu Ao Qing took a deep breath and pressed down the murderous intent in her heart. She knew what Yang Kai said was true; while they had just been talking, the giant insects guarding outside had already become alert, and were looking towards them curiously.
Although she wanted to kill Yang Kai, she didn’t dare strike now.
This verbal spat ended without any results but Yang Kai wasn’t discouraged. After all, his main aim was to plant a seed of doubt within Miao Lin’s heart Since he was currently outnumbered, he would not have any hope if they fought. However, if he bred suspicion amongst the members here, there was at least a slight chance of evening the odds.
In the darkness of the cave, Yang Kai and the Red Cloud Sect disciples were on opposite sides, all quietly restoring themselves. From time to time, the sound of the insects scurrying back and forth could be heard.
The four Red Cloud Sect disciples were clearly reluctant to sit still, wanting to fight their way out the moment they were completely restored. There was a constant discussion while they were healing, always whispering, wary of Yang Kai eavesdropping.
After almost a whole day and night, they finally decided to act. Quietly getting up, and then slowly approaching Yang Kai, Yu Ao Qing’s pretty face full of murderous intent, Miao Lin’s as well, followed by Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian.
As soon as they approached, Yang Kai suddenly opened his eyes and stared at them with a faint smile.
The four Red Cloud Sect disciples paused.
“Let me guess.” Yang Kai leisurely spoke, intentionally lowering the volume of his voice to avoid disturbing those insects, “You’ve decided not to kill me right now?”
Yu Ao Qing’s was as cold as ice, “You knew?”
“How could I not know, this is how you’ve acted the whole time right? Let others walk in front of you, so you can reduce your own risk. I’ve seen you do this countless times now. You now want to force me to take the lead, right?”
Yu Ao Qing slightly nodded and with you’re a cold, ivy voice, she replied. “Since you know, you’d best not resist, if not, you’ll have a nice, new look.”
Yang Kai mockingly replied. “I may not be your opponent, but if you want to kill me, I won’t go down without a fight, if you’re not afraid of disturbing those insects, just try it.”
Yu Ao Qing’s face went stiff, the reason she was speaking lightly, was to avoid drawing the attention of those insects guarding outside. Yang Kai obviously also understood what she was planning, so his voice was also quite quiet.
“I’m warning you, don’t get any ideas, if you want to escape, use your own strength!” Yang Kai snorted, “I won’t be your sacrificial pawn!”
“Don’t you want to escape?” Yu Ao Qing seeing that coercion was useless, slightly eased her tone. “These insects bringing us here, obviously isn’t a good thing. If we stay here our only end is death. If you go out with us, maybe we’ll have a way out!”
Yang Kai decisively shook his head, “I want to escape, but I won’t be used,” he said, “even if I opened the way for you, and everyone escaped from here, I have no guarantee you won’t just attack me once we’re safe.”
“I can give you my word!” Yu Ao Qing saw that Yang Kai’s stance had softened, and hurried to strike while the iron was hot, “As long as you can take the lead, if we can escape, the Red Cloud Sect won’t find trouble with you.”
“Don’t bother; I would never believe a vicious snake like you.” Yang Kai sneered and closed his eyes.
Yu Ao Qing and the others did not know that the outside was surrounded by these insects’ poison fog, but Yang Kai was clear. Even if they were lucky enough to escape from here, they would still have nowhere to run.
That being the case. Why waste the effort.
“Senior Sister Qing, just kill him! If he won’t cooperate, then he’s worthless to us!” Miao Lin had long held murderous intent towards Yang Kai, and now that they could not use him, naturally he wanted to kill him.
Yu Ao Qing took a deep breath. Slowly shaking her head.
Right now, escaping was their most important concern, although this brat was hateful, even if they could kill him they would certainly disturb those insects, it wasn’t worth it.
“If you plan to flee, I won’t get in your way. Hah, I also want to see if you can really leave here!” Yang Kai grinned towards Yu Ao Qing, laughing under his breath.
“I hope those insects gnaw you into a million pieces, so you die without a whole corpse!” Yu Ao Qing cursed Yang Kai, turning to the other three and said, “Let’s go!”
The four Red Cloud Sect disciples quietly left the cave. Perhaps because it was night time, the few giant insects outside were actually not disturbed by their actions, still foolishly standing around.
Soon, the four figures had disappeared into the corridor.
But not half a cup of tea’s time later, the sounds of fierce fighting suddenly burst out, mixed with the cries of the four Red Cloud Sect disciples It was apparent that their escape had been found out, and they were attacked by the insects.
The sounds of fighting gradually faded, until they at last disappeared.
Yang Kai’s sneered a little, completely unmoved, still quietly meditating.
In fact, it wasn’t hard to escape from this insect cave, because these insects weren’t that difficult to deal with, if the four Red Cloud Sect disciples could find a way out, Yang Kai naturally could too, the only thing trapping him here was that strange poison fog. He had no idea how these insects produced this tremendously lethal barrier, which was the dread of any escape he might plan.
After about two hours, Yang Kai heard the sound of heavy footsteps outside.
Opening his eyes, he saw Yu Ao Qing, her hair a mess, clearly exhausted come in, followed by Luo Qian Qian, then by Miao Lin.
Zhang Yu was not with them, she had likely been taken separately.
Those insects had once again brought them here and had also stationed a much stricter guard.
At the moment, the three Red Cloud Sect disciples, who had just been so domineering, now were sluggish and depressed, their bodies filled with large and small wounds, looking extremely miserable.
They really had escaped the insect cave, but they were pursued by the overwhelming number of insects above ground where they had no way out. Ultimately they were forced to fight but just like before they could not kill them all, were surrounded, and then forced back here.
Yu Ao Qing and Luo Qian Qian both sat on the ground, their delicate bodies trembling, Miao Lin not much better off.
Quietly looking towards Yang Kai, Yu Ao Qing was afraid that he would take the chance to add insult to injury, ridiculing them, but Yang Kai didn’t seem to care about them at all, still keeping his eyes shut, silently meditating.
“Senior Sister Qing… Senior Sister Zhang Yu was dragged away by those insects, where do you think she was taken?” Luo Qian Qian whispered, trembling.
“How would I know?” Yu Ao Qing shot back impatiently.
“Are we just going to abandon her?”
“What do you want? We can’t even guarantee our own lives, how are we supposed to take care of her?” Yu Ao Qing clenched her fists, Zhang Yu had not died when they were separated, but was seriously injured and then dragged by the insects into another corridor. What fate was awaiting her?
Yu Ao Qing didn’t know.
While the two were talking, a shrill cry suddenly came from the corridor. The person’s scream was extremely tragic, like they were experiencing a heaven-rending torture.
It was Zhang Yu’s voice!
Yu Ao Qing and Luo Qian Qian’s face went white; their bodies trembling more violently, Miao Lin fell to the ground, “What is happening to Senior Sister Zhang Yu? Who is torturing her?”
The screams never ceased, clearly, she was bearing unimaginable pain.
The two women left in the cave quickly covered their ears, no longer daring to listen.
Yang Kai remained indifferent. These Red Cloud Sect disciples were not good people. Throughout the journey, Yu Ao Qing forced those ordinary people to serve as sacrifices. This current situation was karma, their murderous deeds were simply being repaid, and before dying, they would also experience a cruel torture.
This torture must be extremely brutal, since it was not delivered by another fellow human with empathy.
Zhang Yu’s voice gradually weakened and soon disappeared.
“Heh, we’re dead, there’s no way out.” Miao Lin was scared stupid; he was the weakest one here, only at the Qi Transformation Stage. If not for the Red Cloud Sect needing him as a guide to this island, how could they have been willing to bring him along?
Thinking it was a great opportunity to gain face in the Sect, how would he have known it would become such a disaster, ultimately leading to a dead end. How could Miao Lin, this pleasure-seeking dandy young master, possibly withstand this?
“Don’t say that, we can still escape, Senior Sister Qing will definitely take us out of from here, right?” Luo Qian Qian violently shook her head, naively holding on to hope.
“It’s hopeless, no one can leave here alive.” Miao Lin said dejectedly.
“Everyone shut up!” Yu Ao Qing coldly scolded.
She turned to look at the perpetually calm Yang Kai, comparing him to her Junior Brother and Junior Sister, and then comparing him to her, suddenly discovering that the mental fortitude of this young man was definitely stronger than anyone else present.
From start to finish, he did not show the slightest sign of confusion, nor the slightest uneasiness, instead just quietly sitting there. His temperament was worthy of people’s admiration.
But Yu Ao Qing did not believe he was willing to die!
With the passage of time, Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian’s panic increased. Fear taking over, both unable to control their nerves.
Although Yu Ao Qing’s mental strength was somewhat stronger, she was still trapped here, sitting in the corner, her hands wrapped around her knees, constantly shivering, right now, she was filled with regret. She regretted joining this expedition to find the Hidden Island, and regretted that when the ship sunk she did not first find her father, or else how would she be reduced to this state? if Yu Xiu Ping was here, how would this situation be what it is now?
But in that chaotic situation, Yu Ao Qing did not know whether her dad had even survived, after all, when those giant tentacles had attacked, even the likes of Grand Elder Ding Jia Zu had died. Yu Xiu Ping was a True Element Boundary Ninth Stage, even if he had died, it wouldn’t be unexpected.
[Father, if you are alive, where are you? Your daughter is on the brink of death…]
Praying to the heavens and praying to the dead was useless! The always arrogant Yu Ao Qing involuntarily shed some tears.
Not knowing how long had passed, after Yu Ao Qing had somehow had fallen asleep, she suddenly woke to the sound of heavy breathing coming from in front her.
Yu Ao Qing was shocked, opening her eyes, she saw Miao Lin leaning towards her from up close, madly staring, his eyes wantonly gazing at her with undisguised lust.
“Miao Lin, what are you doing?” Yu Ao Qing said coldly, unable to help herself from shrinking back.
“Senior Sister Qing,” Miao Lin licked his dry lips, laughing perversely, “Junior Brother has a very deep love for you, Senior Sister understands right?”
Yu Ao Qing frowned; she saw that Miao Lin’s state right now was somewhat wrong as if under this great pressure, all his inhibitions and reservations had shattered.
“Senior Sister is a pure heavenly fairy, Junior Brother finds you so beautiful to the point that I spend every night dreaming of you.” Miao Lin continued to approach Yu Ao Qing, his mouth spilling sweet confessions, when the subject suddenly shifted, the content immediately changing drastically, “In my dreams, we speak openly, make love, again and again, experiencing such happiness!”
These words enraged Yu Ao Qing, mercilessly striking Miao Lin’s shoulder.
How could Miao Lin resist? He suddenly flew out, but Yu Ao Qing was exhausted, her palm had no real strength, naturally, she did not hurt Miao Lin.
When he stood up, Miao Lin was still laughing, stepping towards Yu Ao Qing again, shamelessly saying, “Junior Brother knows, Senior Sister is a distinguished and noble, always having eyes higher than her head. But because of this, I fear Senior Sister has never tasted love between a man and woman right?”
Miao Lin had been so explicit, his intentions were obvious.
Yu Ao Qing’s beautiful face became dark, coldly saying, “If you dare say such nonsense again I’ll kill you!”
“Hey, hey!” Miao Lin remained unafraid, “We’re going to die here anyway, death now or death later, what’s the difference? Senior Sister Qing, you only live once, what use is there in preserving your purity in the face of death? It’s such a pity, why not left Junior Brother wait on you tonight, I’ll let you taste this world’s greatest joy and pleasure.”
Yu Ao Qing was breathing rapidly, completely enraged, eyes frosted over, tightly staring at Miao Lin, she had not expected that in this life and death situation, under such enormous pressure, this pathetic Junior Brother she disdained so much, would actually be so bold, even trying to encroach on her body.
Yu Ao Qing obviously would never give in to him, murderous intent flashing in her eyes, as long as Miao Lin dared to approach too close, she swore she would not hesitate to kill him!
Miao Lin also saw this, and while he wanted to act desperately, forcing himself on her, he ultimately could not work up the courage, forming a stalemate with Yu Ao Qing, eventually letting out an embarrassed laugh, and then shrinking back.
Yu Ao Qing could not help letting out a sigh of relief, in such a place, if not the last resort, she really did not want to fight with him.
The cave was again filled with an uneasy silence.
But this silence did not last long, after a stick of incense, the sounds of a man and woman’s heavy breathing floated out.
Yang Kai and Yu Ao Qing both frowned, and looked toward the direction of the sound. With just a glance, Yang Kai went speechless; Yu Ao Qing was also stunned.
Miao Lin did not convince Yu Ao Qing, and having admitted it, he was currently hitting it off with Luo Qian Qian.
Perhaps Miao Lin’s flowery words played a role, perhaps under the pressure of death she needed a release, perhaps Luo Qian Qian was never a chaste woman to begin with, but she and Miao Lin now both clung to each other, rolling on the ground, fiercely groping and kissing one another. Completely unashamed, showing a hot and humid scene.
Listening to these sounds of passion, Yang Kai’s blood flow sped up; his throat drying up, biting his lip in frustration.
Having been separated from Su Yan for three or four months, along with the rise in his cultivation, the Yin-Yang Joyous Unification Art’s influence on him was becoming deeper and deeper.
Fortunately, when he had boarded the Red Cloud Sect ship to search for this island, he had spent his days on edge; there was no time to think about anything else. It was the same when they had arrived here; he was forced to act with Yu Ao Qing and the other Red Cloud Sect disciples. Even though his mind would wander in that direction from time to time, Yang Kai could rely on his own willpower to suppress it.
If there were no accidents, Yang Kai believed that he could hold out until he returned to the High Heaven Pavilion.
But… Yang Kai never imagined that one day there would be a couple engaging in this erotic display, less than thirty feet away, right in front of his eyes!
This kind of stimulus, more than any words, created a violent temptation. It bombarded all of his senses, from the picture it painted to the ambiguous sounds that were heard, and even the erotic scent which wafted about, it was truly an all-encompassing indiscriminate stimulation!
Even if it was a saint, their heart would produce some ripples, not to mention Yang Kai was a dual cultivation practitioner.
It was like starving beggar suddenly had a table of delicacies thrust in front of him.
Yang Kai could not wait to slap Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian dead!
If Yang Kai was so uncomfortable, how could the other outsider, Yu Ao Qing, be any better?
At first she was stunned, her cheeks blushed crimson, then her jaw began to slack, all while staring dumbfounded. It was not until Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian brushed past her feet, breathing heavily, their clothes a mess, that she woke from this dream, quickly jumping up, scrambling over to Yang Kai to escape.
The cave was not large, and Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian tossed about vigorously, leaving Yang Kai and Yu Ao Qing very little space.
The scene was truly bizarre, a once in a thousand years rarity!
A man and a woman lying on the floor, venting their passion and frustration, another man and a woman sitting next to the wall watching, it was like a rich debased couple engaged in some strange fetish play.
Yang Kai and Yu Ao Qing almost simultaneously cursed inside.
But at this time who would go up blame Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian? Yu Ao Qing was already too ashamed to speak, and Yang Kai didn’t have any effort to spare as he was struggling to suppress the fire in his own heart.
Breathing more and more rapidly, their clothes scattered everywhere, Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian’s actions soon intensified, the atmosphere becoming thick, the scene incredibly sensual.
Accompanied by a repressed scream, immediately the air was filled with waves of amorous moans.
Yu Ao Qing was almost involuntarily leaned against Yang Kai, at this time she felt that this youth was the only one she could depend on, or at least, he was more reliable than that frivolous Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian pair.
“Get away!” Yang Kai said harshly but somewhat powerlessly, Yu Ao Qing whether deliberately or accidentally, had pressed her soft tender body against his, almost causing Yang Kai to lose control.
This rough attitude and low curse slightly sobered Yu Ao Qing, she angrily turned and glared at Yang Kai, but what she saw was a pair of scarlet eyes staring back at herself.
These eyes… like Miao Lin’s just now were staring at her full of carnal desire and madness.
Yu Ao Qing’s whole body froze, suddenly remembering, this youth next to her was also a man!
Scrambling to distance herself from him, that intense breathing and moaning continued floating into her ears, like a devil’s whisper, causing endless waves in her body and mind. Her whole body felt hot, like a fire was burning in her chest, even her exhaled breath became heated.
An unknown feeling spread through her, making her feel weak.
In a moment of panic, Yu Ao Qing quickly covered her ears with his hands, anxiously facing the wall, shaking her head back and forth.
She had always been respected in the Red Cloud Sect, usually when one of her peers saw her they became polite, showed off their own strength, or tried to reveal their own profound knowledge, no one had ever spoken to her about men and women, let alone someone shoving this wanton debauchery in her face!
Those lewd sounds and exaggerated movements were like a sledgehammer hitting her head, making her dizzy, almost to the point she couldn’t think anymore.
Time passed extremely slowly, every moment was like a kind of torture.
After God knows how long, Yu Ao Qing heard Junior Sister Luo let out of a sharp, high-pitched call, just like a final scream before death, and the ragged breathing stopped.
She suddenly became faint, [Did Junior Sister Luo… just die?]
But soon, Junior Sister Luo unexpectedly resurrected. Once again letting out moans of delight.
At that moment, Yu Ao Qing no longer held any of her previous arrogance; seeming more like an unapproachable porcupine, only desiring to be left alone.
Yang Kai was also at his limit.
He felt that if he didn’t attack now, he would definitely lose control.
But not waiting for him to strike, many human sized insects rushed into the cave, coming up to Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian, they raised their sharp claws up high, and struck down viciously.
A different kind of scream came out. Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian were nearly skewered through and then dragged out by those big insects.
“Senior Sister Qing, save me!” Luo Qian Qian shouted in panic.
Yu Ao Qing only sat there shivering, how could she have the strength to save her?
Leaving a trail of scarlet blood, Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian were dragged out by the insects, slowly disappearing.
Not long after, mournful screams were heard then gradually weakened, finally disappearing.
As Miao Lin had said before, experience some joy before death, then die without regret.
Waiting until the two’s voices had disappeared for a long time, Yu Ao Qing slowly relaxed her ears, turning around and staring out. Now that they were gone, she could not help but feel relieved.
That scene just now, it was too embarrassing for her to stand. So even knowing that her Junior Brother and Junior Sister had just died, her heart did not hold any regret, just some slight relief.
While she was patting her chest and sighing with relief, she suddenly found that young man was actually staring at her with greedy eyes. All of a sudden, he leapt up, like a predatory cat, ferociously charging toward herself.
His breathing heavy, his breath hot, he carried the same presumptuous look of Miao Lin, no, he was even craziery than Miao Lin.
“You’re seeking death!” Yu Ao Qing cried, thrusting a palm towards Yang Kai.
Yang Kai also struck out, [Burning Sun’s Three Layer Blast]!
Three fierce strands of Yang Yuan Qi penetrated Yu Ao Qing’s delicate arm. Even though she was at the Separation and Reunion Boundary Sixth Stage, it was not long ago that she had fought with the insects. Right now she had not restored much Yuan Qi, coupled with her unstable mental state, she could not bring out even thirty percent of her strength, how could she handle this strange move from Yang Kai.
When that Yuan Qi burst out, she easily resolved it, but no sooner had she done so, a second violent burst of Yuan Qi arrived, Yu Ao Qing circulated her Yuan Qi desperately to resist, finally feeling some fear, until the third Yuan Qi burst came, Yu Ao Qing suddenly became pale.
Releasing a scream, she flew out like a broken paper kite, her jade-like arm trembling; the pain spread through her body, almost causing her to break into tears on the spot.
Not waiting for her to get up, Yang Kai had flown to her side, releasing another palm strike, dislocating her other arm.
Yu Ao Qing endured the pain, thrusting her knee, aiming ruthlessly towards Yang Kai’s crotch. Yang Kai swiftly retreated, barely dodging, striking again with his palm. The wind sweeping over, Yu Ao Qing released a groan, her leg softly falling limp.
With three of her limbs disabled, Yu Ao Qing could not even stand up, not to mention the attack.
She watched this young man with red eyes, like a fierce beast in heat, bend down on top of her, forcefully kissing her neck and cheeks.
While groping her chest with his hand, he did not show the slightest pity or compassion, just violently pressing himself against her in a desperate fashion.
“No… please, stop…” Yu Ao Qing struggled desperately, tears streaming down her face, listening to the sound of her clothes being torn apart, but helplessly unable to resist.
This jade-like body, which was the fantasy that countless Red Cloud Sect male disciples dreamed of, was gradually being exposed in this cave. It had soft, white, delicate, skin, as pure as snow; fragile, like it would shatter with the slightest breeze. A figure that she had the rights to be proud of.
That young man kissed all the way down her body, no, he was biting! Yu Ao Qing could clearly feel where he had surely left rows of teeth marks.
Humiliation filling her, Yu Ao Qing felt like her heart had died. This young man, right now seemed like a completely different person, like a ferocious evil demon, bloodthirsty and merciless, striking terror into people’s hearts.
What little remained of her white skirt was ripped away, leaving Yu Ao Qing completely naked.
While she cried for mercy, Yang Kai stripped his own clothes, exposing his upper body. Soon a deep roar sounded out, like an irrepressible howl.
Yu Ao Qing, unable to resist, slowly closed her eyes, no longer screaming, no longer begging for mercy; just silently letting her tears fall.
Maybe what Miao Lin said before was right.
In the face of certain death, why bother guarding her innocence? Although this young man now looked violent and evil, but compared to that bastard Miao Lin he was at least much better.
A sharp burst of pain rose from her chest as it was pinched; Yu Ao Qing could not help letting out a miserable cry.
Just when she thought she was destined to lose her purity, forever being tarnished, that ruthless young man pressing down on her stopped.
Yu Ao Qing slightly opened her and saw that he was still staring at her with those same red eyes, eyes full of lust, greed and obsession, but from time to time, there also seemed to be signs of struggle within them.
The heat from his breath was enough to melt the iron, and his eyebrows were firmly locked in place, it was like he was enduring some unimaginable pain.
Suddenly, from his body came a burst of violent, heart-stopping energy, instantly making him appear even more demonic.
With this burst of energy, his strength actually increased at a breathtaking pace.
Qi Transformation Fourth Stage, Fifth Stage … Eighth Stage, Ninth Stage …
Separation and Reunion Boundary’s Yuan Qi fluctuations!
Only after reaching Separation and Reunion Boundary Second Stage did his energy begin to stabilize.
With the surge in cultivation, his eyes were filled with more and more madness, but his stubborn resistance also became more and more violent.
Suddenly, he picked himself off of her body, sitting cross-legged directly on the ground clenching his teeth so hard they felt like they would shatter, and roaring, “Stay away from me! Otherwise, don’t blame me for the consequences!”
Yu Ao Qing was momentarily stunned, her dream of amnesty had appeared, struggling to pick up her torn clothes with her broken arm, she covered her pure white naked body. Using her one good leg, she slowly stumbled to the opposite corner of the cave, cautiously watching Yang Kai, her whole body trembling with fear.
Yang Kai was perfectly sober!
From beginning to end, his consciousness was awake, including when he leapt towards Yu Ao Qing, including ripping off her clothes and ravaging her body.
But his primal impulses were completely stimulated by Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian, he simply could not control them.
While reveling in the desires and longing buried in his bones, Yang Kai was also desperately resisting their influence on himself.
Eventually, he used the Golden Skeleton, which immediately suppressed them.
It wasn’t until now that Yang Kai fully understood the kind of desire that Su Yan had spoken about being unable to resist. If the woman here was not Yu Ao Qing but Su Yan instead, even if he had to cross a mountain of knives or a sea of flame, Yang Kai would do anything to reach her. To embrace her.
His blood was ferociously boiling in his chest, spreading to every inch of his body, every cell desiring, longing for the soft fragrance of a woman.
Yuan Qi rioting, the whole cave filled with violent roars, drawing the attention of the giant insect guards.
His upper body was bare, skin a blood-red shade, truly a frightening sight.
Like a deliberate torture for him, not far away, there was a naked, unable to resist beauty. As long as he was willing, at any time, he could ravage her, taste that sweet, sensual taste which, for the current Yang Kai, was no doubt a brutal test of his willpower.
He forced himself to not think about her, even going so far as to erase thoughts of Su Yan’s figure from his mind. Yang Kai sunk his consciousness into his own body, constantly running his True Yang Secret Art, trying his best to deepen his understand of the Golden Skeleton and divert his attention.
The last time he meditated over the Golden Skeleton it was clear how haughty it was. However, Yang Kai knew that this Golden Skeleton held more secrets. It was due to his insufficient strength and insight that caused him to be unable to comprehend it.
Through today’s events, Yang Kai once again deeply experienced this.
Now though, he was not seeking to comprehend the mysteries of the proud Golden Skeleton, he just wanted to stabilize his own instinct and desires.
The effect was pretty good, although the circumstances had not changed; he had finally managed to regain his control.
Yu Ao Qing also knew that Yang Kai as definitely struggling to resist his own desires, naturally she remained silent, trying not to attract Yang Kai’s attention, just curling up in the corner, not moving.
After some time had passed, Yang Kai’s situation gradually improved, the feeling of irritability slowly calmed, the raging Yuan Qi also showing signs of convergence.
After an unknown amount of time, when the violent storm around Yang Kai disappeared, the cave once again became calm.
Taking a deep breath and opening his eyes, Unyielding Will’s temporarily enhancement to his cultivation also slowly disappeared, his state falling back to normal.
Separation and Reunion First Stage … Qi Transformation Ninth Stage, Eighth Stage … Fifth Stage!
Once again stabilizing.
This time, after successfully resisting his carnal desires, his cultivation was also enhanced a stage. Although this was an unexpected harvest, Yang Kai’s remained unmoved. Instead, he slightly frowned as he sat there, motionless, immersed in meditation.
This insight into the Golden Skeleton, although there was no great harvest like before, was not without progress, in that somewhere, Yang Kai could feel a layer of bondage holding him back, and as long as he could break this layer of bondage, another profundity of the Golden Skeleton would reveal itself.
Unfortunately, his strength and understanding of this Martial Path was still too shallow, not enough to break through this barrier.
He could only be patient and seek more opportunities in the future.
With a long breath, Yang Kai looked up and glanced towards Yu Ao Qing in the corner.
A look of panic flashed across her pair of beautiful eyes, there was also a trace of resentment and hatred. For any woman who had encountered such a situation, being able to remain calm and indifferent would be strange.
Yang Kai got up and walked towards her step by step.
“Don’t come any closer!” Yu Ao Qing yelled, putting up a strong front while trying to back away, but behind her was a wall, where could she retreat?
Yang Kai showed an inexplicable smile, slowly squatting in front of her.
“Stay away from me!” Yu Ao Qing, unable to move her hands, in desperation thrust her head towards Yang Kai’s. Yang Kai didn’t move, letting her head smash into his.
With a loud smacking sound, Yu Ao Qing crumbled back, a fresh red bump appearing on her smooth forehead.
Yang Kai reach out one of his hands and lifted her dislocated arm, then yanking down hard. Accompanied by crisp snapping sound, Yu Ao Qing let out a miserable cry. The pain was so intense that she instantly broke out into a fragrant sweat, instinctively throwing a palm toward Yang Kai.
Yang Kai swatted her palm away, easily resolving her attack, and then coldly shouting, “If you want to die, I can kill you right now!”
Being spoken to and stared at so coldly, Yu Ao Qing suddenly came to the realization that she could only have this reaction if her dislocated arm had been reconnected.
Not caring about the confusion in her eyes, Yang Kai placed his hand on her leg, running his Yuan Qi to resolve the hidden injuries there.
A warm feeling flooded in, making Yu Ao Qing somewhat uncomfortable.
Once he had dealt with her injured arm and leg, Yang Kai shifted away and sat down again.
Yu Ao Qing looked at him stunned, not understanding why this young man would be so kind to her. Not long ago, he had ruthlessly attacked her in order to disable her body, desperately trying to force himself on her.
They had not friendship between them, and even had grievances, so why did he help her?
Unable to understand, Yu Ao Qing couldn’t do anything but clench her teeth, secretly observing Yang Kai, while slowly putting on her clothes.
The sounds reaching his ear, Yang Kai naturally knew what she was doing, not having to open his eyes to know that there was infinitely exotic scene taking place, one that aroused fantasy and reverie, but unexpectedly, he did not have much reaction. Contemplating, perhaps when he forced down his built up urges that had accumulated these months just now, they had been completely resolved, so he could remain indifferent.
This was a good way to cultivate, allowing his desires to build up for some time, and then trying to resist them forcibly. Once he was successful, regardless of his strength or state of mind, both could be improved.
Inadvertently, Yang Kai had discovered a suitable practice method for his cultivation path.
The cave was once again quiet; Yang Kai and Yu Ao Qing sat on opposite sides, one patiently waiting while the other, panicky. However, both remained silent.
After about a day or so, there was sudden movement outside, obviously, it was those giant insects coming to take someone away.
Yang Kai looked up, opening his eyes, while Yu Ao Qing was frightened; fearing that she would soon follow in her Junior Brother and Junior Sister’s footsteps.
While worrying, she saw Yang Kai stand up, face the outside and slowly, calmly walked out.
He was not trying to save Yu Ao Qing, this woman was malicious and traitorous. Since Yang Kai had assaulted her before, even if they had not gone all the way, he still did not believe she would spare him if she had an advantage.
Before when he re-set her arm, he was simply returning a favor, after all, his breakthrough this time was also somewhat because of her. Letting her go, the two’s accounts were cleared, nobody owing anyone.
Yang Kai’s purpose for taking the initiative now was to find the insect king. If he wanted to leave this damned place, finding it was his only hope.
Organizing these day’s insights and his own experiences, Yang Kai was sure that the reason these insects had captured himself and others, was on behalf of the insect king.
Perhaps because they saw Yang Kai cooperate on his own, those giant insects did not deal with him like Miao Lin and Luo Qian Qian, instead just opening a path, leading him away, while a few followed behind him, hitting and urging him ahead.
As Yu Ao Qing watched all this, a frown appeared on her face, immediately pouting a little. Naturally, she wanted Yang Kai to die, but if he really was dead, then she would be the only one left. If she had a choice, she would rather Yang Kai survive.
Walking along the numerous corridors for an unknown amount of time, Yang Kai was eventually brought to a huge cavern.
Those giant insects shoved Yang Kai in and then left.
“Old Demon!” Yang Kai cautiously observed his surroundings, while calling out in his mind.
But unlike in the past when he called Old Demon, this time there was no response.
Surprised for a moment, Yang Kai thought some accident might have occurred, and quickly checked, but when he discovered what was wrong, he wasn’t sure if he should laugh or cry.
The old devil had actually sealed up his Divine Sense at some point.
“What are you doing?” Demanded Yang Kai after breaking past the seal.
“Young Master, are you finished?” Old Demon asked, letting out a vulgar laugh.
“What are you talking about?” Yang Kai scowled.
(Faux: This guy is really something else………but at least he didn’t peek LOL)
“You were with that Yu Ao Qing girl and well… heh heh…” Old Demon let out a wretched laugh, “Young Master had said before, when you were together with a woman this Old Servant must seal off his Divine Sense, Old Servant remembers well.”
Yang Kai nodded, and did not bother to explain further, instead changing the subject, “The insect king will be here soon, I’m going to try to subjugate it, you keep watch from the side.”
Hearing what Yang Kai was about to attempt, Old Demon also seriously replied, “This Old Servant will obey!”
Yang Kai scanned the area; it was a very spacious cave, filled with an unpleasant stench. Looking around for a long while, Yang Kai did not see the insect king anywhere.
All that was around were a mountain of bones and corpses.
The Red Cloud Sect’s Zhang Yu, Miao Lin, Luo Qian Qian were all here. These three all seemed to have suffered great pain; eyes bulging out, flesh dried and shriveled like dead wood, their appearance was truly appalling.
Zhang Yu had died first, her corpse withering the most, Miao Lin wasn’t much better than her, only Luo Qian Qian’s corpse still retained some fluid, but only a bit more than the other two.
“Young Master, this insect king seems to have drained their vitality,” Old Demon explained.
“Mm.” Yang Kai nodded slightly before squatting in front of Luo Qian Qian’s body, this Red Cloud Sect female disciple was caught by those giant insects while she was being intimate with Miao Lin, and was to this moment was still naked. This originally beautiful young girl now looked old and haggard, it really made one want to sigh.
However, where was the king?
While Yang Kai was cautiously looking around, Luo Qian Qian’s body seemed to move slightly, and then suddenly a golden light rushed out of her arm, charging towards Yang Kai.
“Young Master watch out!”
Fortunately Yang Kai had been vigilant, and although things happened suddenly, he did not panic, quickly circulating his True Yang Yuan Qi, executing his movement skill, his body flashed, reappearing a few tens of feet away.
However, before he could stabilize his body, the golden light appeared next to him.
[So fast!] Yang Kai was shocked, flashing again.
But once again, just as he reappeared, the golden light had already caught up.
Yang Kai heard a slight buzzing noise coming from the golden light, and he could vaguely make out the figure similar to the other insects, but it was many times smaller.
Was this the insect king?
Yang Kai had thought that the insect king would certainly be large, he did not imagine it would be so small, and that it would posses such amazing speed; also, as the king of these insects, it would no doubt be even more cruel and vicious than the others.
Not relaxing, Yang Kai cast his movement skill again to avoid this insect king, waiting for an opportunity to attack.
After repeating this pattern fifteen times, consuming a massive amount of Yuan Qi, the insect king was still like maggots on rotting bones, and instead of opening the distance between them, instead it was getting closer.
With no way to escape, Yang Kai stopped dodging; steeling his will, he took a stance and punched toward the golden light.
True Yang Yuan Qi burst out!
A shocking scene followed, the golden light did not fly out after being hit by his punch; rather, Yang Kai felt a sharp pain coming from his fist, and the golden light had disappeared!
Hurrying to recover his fist, Yang Kai examined it, his face sinking into dismay; there was now a small bloody hole in his hand, and under his skin was a slight bulge, drilling into his flesh, quickly disappearing.
“What the hell IS this insect?” Yang Kai soul collapsed, he had run over, planning to reign in this insect king, but instead he had suffered a big loss, actually letting it invade his body.
Hastily sitting cross-legged, carefully scanning, he could not find anything wrong with his body. It was as if after drilling into him the insect king had suddenly disappeared.
“Young Master, does feel anything wrong?” Old Demon worriedly asked.
“No.” Yang Kai also found it strange, after all, the three Red Cloud disciples here had all died, the insect king had certainly infiltrated their bodies, consuming their flesh and blood, so why was he alright?
“That can’t be right, check again carefully, this old servant suddenly recalls a type of ancient insect which resembles this one!”
Yang Kai naturally knew something was wrong, and quickly focused his mind, thoroughly examining the arm the insect king had entered again.
After a long time, he finally found some traces.
This insect king had actually found its way into the Star Chart Space on the back of his hand.
This Star Chart Space had opened up when he cultivated his Star Mark martial skill. Usually this space accumulated Yuan Qi, until he activated it, sending out a single massive Yuan Qi explosion.
According to Old Demons words’ at that time, this martial skill was a desperation move, once you used it, either the enemy would die or you would!
The last time in the Inheritance Cave, Yang Kai had relied on his Star Mark skill to finally deal a blow to the Turtle Monstrous Beast.
This strange insect king could actually enter this space, and Yang Kai could clearly feel the Yuan Qi he had amassed inside these past few months was being rapidly consumed.
In just one minute, it had already consumed a quarter of the stored Yuan Qi.
Now that it was inside, Yang Kai could not get it out, unless he copped off his. This discovery had also made Old Demon anxious.
“Bad! This is very bad! Once it finishes swallowing all of your stored Yuan Qi, it will move on to your flesh and blood, once that happens Young Master’s will definitely die, and when Young Master dies, this old servant will be buried with you, how could we let that happen!”
Yang Kai frowned, his thoughts rapidly spinning, looking for a countermeasure.
He had never imagined this insect king would actually be so strange, even his Yuan Qi could be swallowed.
After only a moment, the Yuan Qi stored in the Star Chart Space had decreased significantly, and would soon be empty. Yang Kai helplessly watched as several months’ worth of accumulation for his Star Mark, was turned into a meal for the insect king before he even had a chance to use it.
In order to stop the insect king from completely draining his stored Yuan Qi and then consuming his flesh and blood, Yang Kai quickly circulated his True Yang Secret Art, pouring the True Yang Yuan Qi from his meridians into the Star Chart Space.
The insect king continued to happily swallow everything he poured in.
Although this method was only a temporary solution, but would still buy him some time. Time Yang Kai and Old Demon could use to think about countermeasures.
After a long time, Yang Kai suddenly asked, “Old Demon, can you enter that Star Chart Space?”
Old Demon was stunned for a moment, “Old Servant has not tried, but even if this one could go in, I am not a match for this insect king. Its speed is too fast, and, it is possible it can even swallow souls.”
If that was true, then Old Demon was fundamentally was unable to be its opponent.
“Try it to find out!” Yang Kai urged.
“You really want me to go in?” Old Demon was hesitant.
“Less nonsense!”
Old Demon was helpless, but right now Yang Kai was also at a life and death crossroad, he could not escape either way, so he clenched his teeth, entered the Soul Breaker Awl and came to the back of Yang Kai’s hand, terrified, he grumbled a few words of complaint in his mind, and then rushed into the Star Chart Space.
In the next instant, Old Demon fled out.
“It really can devour souls!” If he had not fled instantly, if the insect king wasn’t busy devouring Yang Kai’s Yuan Qi, he would never have escaped.
“If you can enter then the rest is easy.” Yang Kai chuckled.
“Young Master has a solution?” When Old Demon heard him say this, his spirit also lifted.
“I’m not certain; I’ll just have to try!” Yang Kai said, directly activating Unyielding Will, crazily extracting Yuan Qi from the Golden Skeleton in, while simultaneously exploding Yang Liquid drops in his Dantian, then forcing a massive amount of energy to constantly pour into the Star Chart Space!
Yang Kai’s body could be described as having three Yuan Qi warehouses.
One was the Star Chart Space, this was his Star Mark’s exclusive warehouse; the stored Yuan Qi was also the least.
The second was the Yang Liquid in his dantian, which was the foundation of his battle strength; all his martial skills and explosive force relied on this Yang Liquid.
The third and largest warehouse was the Golden Skeleton! The Golden Skeleton would accept any kind of energy; all the pills he took, all the spirit grass and spirit fruit he ate, all the Qi he gathered while cultivating, as long as it was not Yang in nature, it would all be stored here.
So the amount of Yuan Qi stored in the Golden Skeleton was much larger than the sum of the Yang Liquid in his dantian.
Using this two-pronged approach, the amount of Yuan Qi circulating in Yang Kai’s body right now could be described as shocking.
With this energy pouring into the Star Chart Space, the insect king’s swallowing pace shot up as well, becoming almost intoxicated.
“Young Master, are you,” Old Demon paused, “are you trying to cause it to burst?”
“At best this will lead to a stalemate, not its death, it will be up to you to kill it,” Yang Kai answered concisely, and then focused on channeling energy into the Star Chart Space.
As time passed, the insect king gradually became aware of a problem.
It had already developed some basic spirituality, or else it would not be able to command its henchmen to hunt down and capture prey for it. In the past, when it acquired its victims, the first thing it would do was swallow the various energies stored within them, after swallowing that clean, it would move on to the flesh and blood.
But this time something was different, this new prey’s energy was actually like a steady stream, not showing any signs of depletion. Although in the beginning it was extremely happy, having an unlimited supply of food, but after a while, its body began to bloat up.
Unable to swallow any more, the energy still kept pouring in, rushing towards its body. It suddenly became restless, scurrying about within the Star Chart Space.
But after coming in so easily, how could it be so simple to leave?
Yang Kai was prepared, knowing how fast it was, once it was free it would be difficult to catch, naturally he couldn’t let it escape, so he kept pouring energy into the Star Chart Space non-stop, sealing the one entrance so that it couldn’t leave.
Yang Kai’s True Yang Secret Art was pushed to the limit, his dantian’s Yang Liquid was also more than half drained, all of it poured into the Star Chart Space, and was subsequently swallowed clean by the insect king.
A buzzing sound came from the back of his hand; obviously the insect king wanted to escape.
Suddenly showing a grin filled with ruthlessness, Yang Kai exploded a few drops of Yang Liquid, gathered it together with the Yuan Qi extracted from the Golden Skeleton, and then forced it all into the Star Chart Space.
Yang Kai had long since turned bright red, his whole body emitting steam, like it had been baked under a burning sun, his skin dripping blood here and there.
“Old Demon!” Yang Kai felt it was time, and cried out.
Old Demon, having watched Yang Kai act so decisively, also became ruthless, resolutely entering the Soul Breaker Awl and charging into the Star Chart Space.
Yang Kai could feel Old Demon and the Insect King fighting within the Star Chart Space. Although in the beginning, Old Demon was not the king’s opponent, the Insect King had swallowed so much energy, it could not digest it all and had become severely bloated, greatly reducing its speed, allowing Old Demon to fight with it.
As time passed, and the Insect King was forced to swallow more and more energy, Old Demon gradually reversed the situation, seizing the upper hand, the Soul Breaker Awl displaying its might, constantly forcing the Insect King to retreat, inflicting countless scars.
The back of his hand was hot. Having been forced to channel so much Yuan Qi, Yang Kai had also suffered some injury. Observing it now, the originally hidden star chart was now radiating light; an endless stream of glowing stars was burned into his eyes, and amongst those stars Yang Kai could vaguely see one black and one gold light clash back and forth.
The air began to fill with a burnt taste since due to him having poured in too much True Yang Yuan Qi, his hand had been burned.
Despite this, Yang Kai insisted, still channelling in Yuan Qi. The huge Yuan Qi not only burdened the Insect King, forcing it to consume too much, even Old Demon had been affected.
Old Demon’s soul and the Soul Breaker Awl were evil things, True Yang Yuan Qi was their nemesis, if not for Yang Kai’s approval, Old Demon could not store the Soul Breaker Awl in his body.
Usually, there was no problem, but now, Old Demon faintly felt like the heat from the True Yang Yuan Qi melting him.
An uneasy feeling filled Old Demon, causing him to urge Yang Kai with his thoughts, but all he got in response was silence.
After what seemed like thousands of years, Old Demon only vaguely heard Yang Kai call him,
“Come out!”
Old Demon had almost despaired; he had even thought that Yang Kai planned to cruelly destroy him along with the Insect King, and had thus refused to respond to him. So when he heard his Young Master call out, his mood suddenly shifted from that of a dead victim’s to a cherished friend’s.
Not daring to stay any longer, when Yang Kai opened a path out of the Star Chart Space, Old Demon instantly fled.
The Insect King also wanted to flee, but that gap which had opened was quickly closed, not give it any chance.
[Star Mark!] Yang Kai loudly roared, slowly raising his right fist. Endless star images scattered about the sky, this gloomy cave suddenly resembling a bright starry night.
A loud noise burst out, the whole insect cave violently trembled, and blood sprayed out from Yang Kai.
There was no trace of the Star Mark martial skill materializing, but Old Demon instantly understood what had happened. His heart in shock, he could not help but exclaim, “Young Master!”
“I’m alright!” Yang Kai spat out a few mouthfuls of blood, his face pale, panting heavily, he turned his eyes to his right hand to see.
The back of his hand was bloodied, and even the white of his bones was vaguely visible, but after carefully checking, Yang Kai suddenly laughed.
The Insect King was dead, the breath from its body completely dissipated.
After being bloated with so much energy, heavily wounded by Old Demon, and then finally eating a full powered Star Mark, if it had survived it would be a miracle.
Old Demon was shocked speechless. After a long silence he sincerely praised, “Young master, Old Servant deeply admires!”
Not admiring was impossible; after all, Yang Kai’s Star Mark was not directed at an external target, but instead exploded in the back of his hand.
If there had been the slightest miscalculation, Yang Kai would have died!
Fortunately, Yang Kai’s control was superb. Most of the explosion was channeled to the Insect King, while his body had only borne a little bit of it.
Being so decisive with his own life, this was not something an average person could do. Old Demon was thoroughly impressed.
“Keep a close eye on our surroundings; I may have to heal for a few days!” Yang Kai hurriedly said as he ripped his clothes, wrapping the injury on his right hand and closed his eyes.
Star Mark was an extremely powerful martial skill, allowing Yang Kai to knock a sixth-order Monster Beast to the ground. Now, even if he had only taken a fraction of its power, it was not something his Qi Transformation Fifth Stage cultivation could handle.
Right hand in excruciating pain, Yuan Qi in disarray, five viscera and six organs all shifted and damaged.
The only thing that gave Yang Kai some relief was that although the back of his hand was a bloody mess, the Star Chart Space still existed, meaning there was no worry about being unable to use Star Mark.
After spending a lot of effort, Yang Kai finally calmed the Yuan Qi chaos in his meridians, constantly running his True Yang Secret Art, then controlling his True Yang Yuan Qi to heal his wounds and clear the body of scars.
After two full days, Yang Kai slowly opened his eyes, first asking, “Those insects did not come in?”
This had been his biggest concern, those small insects did not pose much of a threat to him, their order was low, only their numbers were annoying, but those giant insects were clearly not just low-grade Monster Beasts, any one of them was not worse than the Red Cloud Sect disciples he had been caught with.
“No.” Old Demon replied, “Those insects did not dare to enter here, after all, this is the king’s residence.”
“That’s good.” Yang Kai breathed a sigh of relief, also noticing that his injuries seemed to have recovered much faster than before, he proceeded to unwrap the cloth on his right hand. Although the back of his hand was still bloody, it was clearly healing very quickly as he could no longer see his bones and tendons.
Old Demon seemed to sense Yang Kai’s doubts, explaining, “Young master last time on the Red Cloud Island peninsula you refined a few Congealing Blood Beads, enhancing your body’s Blood Force, allowing you to restore and recover faster than ever before. The more you enhance your Blood Force, the stronger your vitality will become.”
“So it was like that.” Yang Kai nodded.
“Young Master, now that the insect king is dead, have you noticed if it left behind anything?” Old Demon suddenly asked an odd question to Yang Kai.
“Left something behind, like what?”
“Old Servant is not sure, but the Young master should carefully check.”
Hearing how serious Old Demon was, Yang Kai also frowned, immediately examining his body again.
After a long time, he really found something unusual in his body, an unusual ray of energy gathered in his dantian, which was neither his own cultivated True Yang Yuan Qi, nor anything which had been absorbed by the Unyielding Golden Body. Hidden within his dantian like it was, if not for Old Demon’s reminder, Yang Kai would not have found it.
“What is this? The Insect King’s residual energy?” Yang Kai wondered.
Listen to his description, Old Demon could not help but breathe a sigh of relief, exclaiming, “Sure enough!”
“You know what this is? Quickly say.”
“Does Young master remember when Old Servant had said this thing was similar to an ancient insect I had heard of before?”
Yang Kai nodded.
“Before, Old Servant simply had some suspicion, but was not sure; after all, I have never personally encountered this kind of thing, just heard about it. Then when Old Servant fought with it, that suspicion was fifty or sixty percent confirmed, and now with young master’s description, Old Servant is now certain it really is that kind of ancient insect.”
“What kind of insect?”
“A Heaven Devouring Insect!” After Old Demon had spoken this name, he quickly offered congratulations, “Congratulations Young Master, receiving this exceptional treasure, young master’s good fortune is immense, Old Servant is deeply envious.”
“Get to the point.” Yang Kai sat up, ready to listen to Old Demon explain these unknown things.
“This kind of ancient insect can swallow anything, it especially likes to devour a variety of energy and flesh and blood, and contained within every Heaven Devouring Insect’s body there is some kind of opportunity, if someone can refine it, they can acquire great benefits. This opportunity can be many things, like a supreme secret art, a mighty martial skill, a powerful artifact, or even a chance to unlock some hidden strength in one’s own body! Thousands of possibilities, impossible to tell, it all depends on that person’s luck.”
“How can an insect’s body contain these things? Allowing a cultivators strength to rise to the heavens I can understand, but for it to hold a supreme secret art or a mighty martial skill is too bizarre, right?” Yang Kai asked suspiciously.
“What young master does not know is that this insect is not born like a regular insect, instead it is a rare object born from the heavens itself, a treasure so wondrous Old Servant cannot help but sigh that he did not receive it. Moreover, in this world there are many supreme secret arts and martial skills that were formed spontaneously by the heavens, were spied upon by mortals, and then spread throughout the world, so an insect having such a thing in its body is not that surprising, let alone, this famous Heaven Devouring Insect!” Old Demon’s voice was full of envy, and after finishing and seeing Yang Kai not respond for a long time, apparently stunned, he said, “Young Master does not believe?”
“I am not certain, but since it can be refined, after refining it I will know if it is truly so amazing or not.” Yang Kai did not commit or deny.
Hearing about it was one thing, but seeing was believing; not to mention everything about this Heaven Devouring Insect that Old Demon knew was hearsay, what the truth was could only be explored.
Once again closing his eyes, Yang Kai tried to form a link between himself and the strange energy trace in his dantian, running the True Yang Secret Art, using his hot True Yang Yuan Qi to refine it.
One day, two days, day after day constantly refining. Eventually that trace of energy slowly showed a change; in the beginning it conflicted with Yang Kai, after all, it was something that formerly belonged to the Insect King, not him.
But after continuously refining it, it gradually absorbed Yang Kai’s energy, and finally one day, it suddenly divided into two, and uncontrollably flooded into Yang Kai’s body. At the same time, Yang Kai felt a burst of searing pain on his back, coming from his shoulder blades, just like a hot iron had been pressed onto them.
The pain came quickly, and left just as fast, not giving Yang Kai any time to react.
After carefully checking his own strength, he discovered he was still Qi Transformation Stage – Fifth Stage!
[This damn Old Demon lied!] Yang Kai cursed.
Although he had not believed Old Demon’s words before, but he also couldn’t suppress the faint hope in his heart to enhance his strength.
But after refining this thing, his cultivation had not increased at all, much less acquiring some secret art, martial skill, or precious artifact.
After Yang Kai opened his eyes, Old Demon could not wait to ask, “What harvest has Young Master gained?”
“What shit harvest, I gained nothing.” Yang Kai snapped back angrily.
Old Demon was shocked, “Impossible, this was definitely the legendary Heaven Devouring Insects residual Heavenly Law Energy!”
“Pft, legends are there to deceive people!” Yang Kai snorted.
“No no no, Young Master does not understand, Old Servant, remembers that before he had an enemy who because he refined a Heaven Swallowing Insect, obtained a supreme secret art, and went on to achieve extraordinary heights. This is not just a legend, but something that really happened, Old servant swears on his life… on his soul, this is the truth.” Old Demon being ‘dead’ could only swear on his soul.
In general, if Old Demon dared swear upon his soul he would have at least a ninety percent certainty.
Listening to him, Yang Kai’s face couldn’t help becoming serious.
If this was really the so-called Heavenly Law Energy, it certainly would contain some harvest. Reviewing what had just happened; Yang Kai focused his attention on both his shoulder blades.
When he had successfully refined that trace of strange energy, his shoulder blades had both felt a surge of heat, in addition to that, nothing else had happened.
Focusing there, Yang Kai could clearly feel his Yuan Qi flow towards his shoulder blades, giving rise to a strange feeling like it was bound.
When this feeling came, he involuntarily increased his output of Yuan Qi.
Suddenly, the bondage was broken.
*Whoosh* Suddenly, there was a burst of light and sound, filling the cave with a brilliant radiance, shocking Yang Kai.
“My heavens …” Old Demon gasped, if he had a physical form, it would now be staggering. This old devil lord had lived for an incredible number of years, and although he had been sealed, only recently regaining his freedom, his knowledge was vast, almost nothing in the world could make him gaffe.
But now, he was completely stunned!
“This is…” Yang Kai was also shocked. He had never expected such a fantastical thing to occur.
On his back, two wings composed completely from his own True Yang Yuan Qi had sprouted. These wings were not large, only about 2 meters long, their shape and form made from True Yang Yuan Qi appeared quite unstable, seemingly fluctuating with the changes in Yang Kai’s thoughts and mood.
Looking behind him, Yang Kai’s eyes were trembling.
This pair of flaming wings which had sprouted from his shoulder blades revealed a kind of brilliant beauty, especially because their colour was related to his True Yang Yuan Qi, the colour of burning flames, displaying a wild uninhibited feeling.
Yang Kai and Old Demon did not speak, as if they had forgotten how to form words; all their attention was concentrated on this pair of wings.
After a long time, Yang Kai suddenly recovered, quickly asking, “Old Demon, what are these?”
After a loud sound of saliva being swallowed, Old Demon replied, “Heaven Soaring Force!”
“An artifact?”
“Wrong. This treasure cannot be compared to a mere artifact, this is an ability Heaven has bestowed up you young master. Old Servant does not know just how profound this ability is; only with time and study will young master be able to unlock all of its mysteries.”
Yang Kai nodded slightly, his emotions stirring slightly, he proceeded to push the pair of Flaming Yang Wings into a flapping motion, causing a strong wind to blow within the cave, actually lifting him off the ground.
But he had not flown too high when he suddenly hit the ceiling. The two Flaming Yang Wings also suddenly disappeared, causing Yang Kai to face plant into the ground and fall into confusion.
After spending a long time contemplating and testing, Yang Kai was now certain that he had really gained the Heaven Soaring Force from the Heaven Devouring Insect and that this pair of Flaming Yang Wings was indeed like an extension of his body.
After confirming all this, Yang Kai couldn’t help celebrating inside!
Stranded here with the Red Cloud Sect cultivators, these days, although Yang Kai did not confide in Old Demon, he was still constantly worried; after all, he did not know how to return home.
Originally he thought to cultivate until he reached the True Element Boundary, allowing him to fly, or capture a flying Monster Beast somewhere on Hidden Island, forcing it to carry him on its back, but no matter which plan there were serious problems.
From Hidden Island to Sea City was thousands of miles away; even an Immortal Ascension cultivator would not necessarily be able to fly that far. On the other hand, without at least reaching the True Element Boundary, how would he catch a flying Monster Beast?
But now, by using his True Yang Yuan Qi to form his Flaming Yang Wings, all of Yang Kai’s problems were instantly solved.
These Flaming Yang Wings, according to Old Demon’s information, were derived from the Heaven Devouring Insect’s residual Heavenly Law Energy, and were not an artifact, nor a martial skill, but rather a kind of innate ability.
The only problem was that displaying this ability required one to constantly consume Yuan Qi, and the consumption was extreme.
Inside a cave was obviously not suitable for testing the Flaming Yang Wings, so Yang Kai calmed the excitement in his heart, suddenly thinking of a question, “Old Demon, those insects outside …”
“Young Master wants even more? This Heaven Devouring Insect is very rare, though it has produced many descendants, but the insects outside cannot be considered Heaven Devouring Insects, just regular Monster Beasts.” Old Demon obviously knew what Yang Kai was thinking.
“Tch!” Yang Kai sighed, but also considered, by eradicating those insects outside, if each one had even a little Heavenly Law Energy, would it be worth it?
Lifting his mood, Yang Kai said, “However, after refining the Heaven Devouring Insect, I feel like I can control those insects!”
“Is that possible?” Old Demon asked surprised.
“It’s worth a try.” Yang Kai focused his mind and not long after, outside the cave a large number of insects had gathered, some big some, some small, but all of them stopped just outside the chamber, as if this cave was some kind of forbidden area.
“Oh, it works!” Yang Kai laughed.
The small insects, although lacking in combat strength, were massive in number, and to Yang Kai’s delight, the giant insects were all third or fourth order Monster Beasts, two were even fifth order.
Fifth order Monster Beasts were equivalent to True Element Boundary masters.
With their help, hunting for treasure on this island would be much easier.
This trip deep into the tiger’s den really was the right decision.
Feeling happy, Yang Kai left the king’s cave and those large and small insects quickly parted, opening up a path. When Old Demon saw this scene, he could not help but be amazed.
Now, Yang Kai intended to leave the insect cave, taking this group of insects to explore Hidden Island, but he suddenly remembered there was another person here.
Yu Ao Qing! He did not know the status of the Red Cloud Sect’s peerless female disciple.
If she was dead, then that, was that their prior resentments could be considered settled anyways. If she was alive, Yang Kai wanted to bring her out.
He was not really concerned with her well-being, but there were certainly more Red Cloud Sect masters on this island; if he were to carelessly encounter them, having Yu Ao Qing nearby could be considered having a life-saving chip.
Having thought of it, Yang Kai walked towards the place where Yu Ao Qing was.
After a long walk, he finally came to the cave he had been held in previously, but when Yang Kai probed inside, his look immediately changed.
Inside this cave there were actually others with Yu Ao Qing.
In addition to her, there were three more people!
Two of them were the Red Cloud Sect younger generation disciples, and the other was an Elder, Yang Kai remembered his name from the ship.
Meng Xing Yuan, although he couldn’t be compared with Yu Xiu Ping, was also a master at the True Element – Seventh Stage.
How could they be here? Yang Kai looked surprised.
Meng Xing Yuan and others being here, it could be considered Yu Ao Qing’s good fortune. After the ship had sunk, the Red Cloud Sect’s people had been scattered, Meng Xing Yuan so far had found several disciples, and like Yu Ao Qing’s group, had been exploring the island while looking for more Sect members.
After many days, and after encountering many dangers, the disciples had suffered heavy casualties, and until now, only two remained.
When they arrived here today, they discovered that the outer layer of fog was unusual. Meng Xing Yuan flew inside with the two disciples and began searching. After some investigation, they found the body of Qi Yuan, and then came across the insect cave.
At the mouth of the cave, there was a piece of Yu Ao Qing’s broken dress fabric, letting Meng Xing Yuan know the situation was not good. Leading the two disciples, they secretly snuck in, thinking it would be extremely dangerous, but to their surprise, along the way they did not suffer any attacks, and easily found Yu Ao Qing.
How could they have known that the insects had just been summoned by Yang Kai; naturally nothing was in their way.
When Yang Kai came back, Meng Xing Yuan and the Red Cloud disciples had just arrived, where they were listening to a dispirited Yu Ao Qing describe the terrifying experience she had endured, as well as how Zhang Yu and Luo Qian Qian had met their end.
When Yang Kai appeared at that time, both sides were stunned momentarily.
Meng Xing Yuan never recalled the Red Cloud Sect having such a disciple, and Yu Ao Qing apparently did not expect to see Yang Kai alive again.
But soon, Yu Ao Qing’s eyes were flooded with hatred and anger, clenching her teeth, “Uncle Meng, this person is not my Red Cloud Sect’s disciple, but a bastard who snuck on board out ship! Junior Brother Qi Yuan was also killed by him! Uncle Meng I beg you to seek justice for Junior Brother Qi Yuan!”
She did not mention how Yang Kai had assaulted her; afraid it would damage her image.
Before she did not dare to plot against Yang Kai; first off, trapped here, just Yang Kai and her, they could be considered comrades in suffering, and second, physically and mentally exhausted, she was not Yang Kai’s opponent.
But things were different now; Meng Xing Yuan and the others had found her, she could safely leave. As for Yang Kai, who had stripped her clothes and desecrated her body, how would Yu Ao Qing be willing to let it go?
She could not wait to personally rip Yang Kai’s corpse into ten thousand pieces, to resolve the fury in her heart!
As long as he died, no one would know what happened that day, in the future she would still be Red Cloud Sect’s heaven-sent woman!
After saying this, Yu Ao Qing turned her head slightly and sneered proudly at Yang Kai.
Meng Xing Yuan’s face went cold, shouting, “Little brat, your courage is not small! You dare kill my Red Cloud Sect’s disciple! Kill him for me!”
He quickly ordered the two Red Cloud disciples.
As soon as his voice faded, the two disciples did not hesitate to condemn Yang Kai to death!
Yang Kai stared at Yu Ao Qing, a chill emitting from his eyes, his image instantly flashed, appearing several tens of feet away, and when the two Red Cloud disciples pursued, Yang Kai flashed several times in succession, quickly disappearing.
“He’s fast!” Meng Xing Yuan could not help but admire, that movement skill was very profound, it was certainly a High Grade Martial Skill.
“Qing’er are you ready to leave?” Meng Xing Yuan turned and asked.
“En.” Yu Ao Qing nodded.
“Good, Uncle will take you out then. I’d like to see how that little brat plans to leave that circle of fog!” Meng Xing Yuan snorted, no longer caring about Yang Kai. As long as the periphery was surrounded by that circle of fog, any cultivator below True Element Boundary could never leave, unless they possessed a flying artifact.
“Uncle you have to kill him, he even wanted to take advantage of Junior Sister Luo Qian Qian before. If I had not forcefully blocked him, he might have succeeded.” Yu Ao Qing’s beautiful face was cold, showing no guilt dumping fake sins on Yang Kai’s head.
Hearing this, Meng Xing Yuan anger flared, “He dares to have ideas about my Red Cloud Sect’s disciple, he truly does not fear heaven’s wrath! Qing’er rest assured when Uncle catches him, I’ll skin him alive!”
Yu Ao Qing quietly revealed cold smile.
(Faux: This b**ch really deserves a gruesome death)
Not long after, Meng Xing Yuan and Yu Ao Qing suddenly heard a burst of intense fighting coming from outside, and a moment later, the two Red Cloud Sect disciples who had chased Yang Kai out stumbled back.
“What happened?” Meng Xing Yuan asked.
“Elder Meng, there are a lot of insects coming!” One of them hurriedly replied, his expression dark.
Not needing him to finish, the loud buzzing that reached Meng Xing Yuan’s ear had already given him the answer. The next moment, he saw a large, dark, cloud-like mass come towards them.
This dark cloud was composed entirely of fist-sized, black winged insects, and from the looks of it, these insects fully occupied the corridor, an almost endless number.
Yu Ao Qing cried out, “Uncle Meng, these are the insects which caught us.”
Meng Xing Yuan face became serious, shouting, “Get behind me!”
Stepping forward, he arrived in front of the Red Cloud disciples, launching a large palm strike, a ferocious blast of True Yuan Qi burst forth.
The insects who were hit by Meng Xing Yuan strike, like fat dumplings, fell to the ground; suddenly creating a void in front.
“Elder Meng is so strong!” One of the Red Cloud Sect disciples shouted, unable to hold back his praise.
“We’re breaking out, fight!” Meng Xing Yuan roared loudly, taking the lead, he began attacking fiercely, the two Red Cloud disciples guarding Yu Ao Qing in the middle, following close behind Meng Xing Yuan.
Advancing step by step, Meng Xing Yuan’s every attack would kill several tens of insects, but the number of these insects was too great. Unable to kill them all at once, he attacked dozens of times, quickly beginning to lose his breath, pausing briefly, he took a deep breath, calming his rioting pulse, and once again casting his vicious moves.
As they fought their way out, the ground became full of dead insects, like a thick layer of pavement.
After escaping about five hundred feet or so, Meng Xing Yuan suddenly stopped, his face showing a sharp change.
From the depths of the cave came a burst of cracking sounds. There was also dirt falling on top of his head, immediately followed by a deep rumbling sound. The whole cave shaking violently.
“Not good!” Meng Xing Yuan yelled, “The cave is collapsing, run!”
Behind him, the three Red Cloud disciples became pale, hurrying to keep up with him.
But in front of them were countless insects blocking their path. Desperate to move faster, Meng Xing Yuan did not reserve his strength, but he still could not force the insects back, some rushing past him and attacking the three Red Cloud disciples behind, almost sending them into a panic.
After running about three hundred feet, the corridor in front of them suddenly collapsed, completely blocking the way.
Meng Xing Yuan and the three Red Cloud disciple’s faces sunk, Yu Ao Qing was especially depressed. She did not expect that just as a ray of hope had found her, she would again fall into despair.
While listening to the endless rumblings sounds, Yang Kai had been racing towards the cave’s entrance. Just as he exited the cave, a huge plot of land beneath him suddenly sank down.
Not daring to stay, Yang Kai flew forward.
When he was attacked by the two Red Cloud disciples, Yang Kai had ordered those insects to destroy the cave. He knew that if he were to face a True Element Boundary master he would certainly suffer; so now that he could command this insect swarm, naturally he took advantage of them.
These insects were expert diggers, destroying their own lair was easy.
As the landslides and fissures continued, Yang Kai had already flown out several miles. When he stopped and looked back, all he could see where the insect cave had been was a several mile radius pit, like something had hollowed out the earth.
The entire insect cave had completely collapsed.
But Yang Kai still was not relieved, he did not know if such a collapse would be able to take a True Element Boundary master’s life, his mind raced, ordering the insects to search underground for signs of the Red Cloud Sect cultivators, so he could solve this problem once and for all!
Quietly waiting for a cup of tea’s worth of time, Yang Kai suddenly heard a loud and anguished scream come from the ground.
It was Meng Xing Yuan’s voice. The insects must have found him, and were currently fighting.
Gradually, his voice became weak until finally it could not be heard, eventually disappearing altogether.
Meng Xing Yuan, a True Element Boundary master was dead, those far weaker Red Cloud Sect disciples naturally could not survive, possibly having been buried the moment insect cave had collapsed.
“Unfortunately, a beautiful, jade-like girl has died.” Old Demon sighed, Yu Ao Qing is absolutely a rare beauty, but this woman was wicked, a vicious cunning snake, someone truly deserving of death.
Old Demon just felt it was a waste.
Yang Kai remained silent, completely indifferent, just quietly standing in place.
Not long after, from the surrounding few miles, countless insects crawled out from the ground, quickly surrounding him, waiting for the orders.
These insects would be a great help to Yang Kai in surviving and exploring the island.
Since he had mixed in with the Red Cloud Sect, Yang Kai had to remain cautious, always walking on thin ice until now. He was finally free of the Red Cloud Sect cultivators, giving birth to a sense of relaxation and freedom.
It was time to prepare for any future battles.
These insects could fly, and their speed was not slow, Yang Kai did not have to worry about them keeping up.
Leading the insects to the edge of the fog bank, Yang Kai issued a command to open a path.
A few giant insects flew forward, straight into the fog and began swallowing.
Right before his eyes, this tens of miles blockade soon had a gap gnawed open. Yang Kai’s suddenly understood that this fog could be considered an extremely lethal skill, but only the giant insects could employ it, the fist-sized insects did not have this ability.
The next few days, Yang Kai did not rush to explore in the island, but first found a secluded place to familiarize himself with his Flaming Yang Wings.
A few days later, Yang Kai was floating high above Hidden Island, overlooking the whole island.
From the air, he could observe everything about this mysterious island.
Recalling the map he had received a few months ago from Madam Jiang, Yang Kai quickly identified his position and began searching for the correct path forward.
After flying a short distance, Yang Kai dropped to the ground and used his movement skill.
The speed of his Flaming Yang Wings was much faster, but the consumption of Yuan Qi was proportionally larger. On this mysterious Hidden Island, Yang Kai did not dare to waste the Yang Liquid in his dantian.
Also, flying made it easier to expose himself. It was likely that a flying Monster Beast or a Red Cloud Sect master would spot him.
Even though using his movement skill was a lot slower, it was still much safer.
For the next few days, Yang Kai rushed about, if he encountered any precious treasure, he quickly consumed it, refining it into energy for his Unyielding Golden Body.
Hidden Island was indeed filled with danger, strong Monster Beasts were everywhere, if Yang Kai had not been careful, he would have been involved in many desperate fights.
These days he did not find any traces of the Red Cloud Sect cultivators, leading Yang Kai to suspect that they had possibly all died.
But when he arrived at his final destination, Yang Kai finally found some traces of human activity.
He quickly increased his vigilance.
The center of the island had a solitary peak, only about a thousand feet tall. From the rocky rugged terrain and the solitary beautiful landscape, Yang Kai could confirm that this was the end goal described on the map he had obtained from Madam Jiang.
Unfortunately, it seemed like the Red Cloud Sect had also targeted this place. The only question was how many people were gathered and what kind of strength did they possess?
Arriving at the solitary peak, Yang Kai hesitated for a long time before finally gritting his teeth and climbing up.
Calming his heartbeat and holding his breath, Yang Kai had climbed halfway up the mountain when a burst of violent noise came from the peak, the entire solitary peak was trembling as well.
Surprised, not knowing what kind of changes had occurred above, Yang Kai increased his pace.
After an incense stick worth of time had passed, Yang Kai came to the summit. Quietly lurking to the side, he stealthily looked toward the direction of the sound.
Approximately a hundred feet away, several Red Cloud Sect cultivators were bombarding a stone gate.
Observing for a while, Yang Kai could not help but be relieved! Among the people gathered, there was no sign of the Red Cloud Sect Grand Elder Huo Xiang Lan. Their leader was Yu Xiu Ping, the few remaining people were mostly True Element Boundary masters.
But at the moment, these people looked quite embarrassed. Along the way they had probably experienced a lot of hardship; many people had been injured and were covered with blood stains.
Fortunately, they had been reduced to this state, or else Yang Kai estimated that he would never have gotten this close without being found out.
These people were all wielding their weapons and were casting their martial skills, again and again bombarding the stone door in front of them. Every attack would cause the stone door to shake violently, then from the stone gate, a bright radiance would be emitted, neutralizing their attacks and leaving the door unscathed.
“Senior Brother Yu…” One of the cultivators asked while panting, “What should we do now?”
Yu Xiu Ping looked bleak, and unwilling, “What else can we do? Continue attacking, we must break open this damn stone door! My Red Cloud Sect has suffered such heavy losses, even the two Grand Elders have fallen, if we gain nothing after all this, what face would we have to return? “
Hearing this, Yang Kai couldn’t help but celebrate.
So Huo Xiang Lan had died! The only question was how that Immortal Ascension Boundary old woman had met her end; but this news undoubtedly let Yang Kai relax a lot, no longer needing to constantly worry.
Yu Xiu Ping rushed forward, unreservedly mobilizing his True Qi, again and again bombarding the stone door, loudly roaring, “The two Grand Elders have fallen, our disciples have taken heavy casualties, my daughter is also missing! All of these sacrifices were to bring us here, if I cannot break open this door, then I will kill myself here, why should I bother living on in this world!
Yu Xiu Ping’s crazy words let the others gathered become depressed; this expedition to explore Hidden Island was undoubtedly a wrong decision.
If they had known this trip would be so dangerous, how could they have left the Red Cloud Sect? Apparently, the Red Cloud Sect’s strength was not enough to qualify them to explore this place.
But Yu Xiu Ping’s words obviously also aroused their fighting spirit, those who were not busy restoring themselves, all became silent, gathering their strength and again attacking the stone door.
This stone door must have had a barrier erected on it long ago, and although it was extremely strong, it was by no means unbreakable. The True Element Boundary masters constantly released an onslaught of attacks towards it, filling the solitary peak with crashing noises, and then, after less than an hour of effort later, the stone door finally started showing some small cracks.
Finally seeing hope, the Red Cloud Sect cultivators’ attacks became more and more brutal.
Gradually, more and more cracks appeared on the stone door; it was obviously close to breaking.
But suddenly, a loud piercing eagle cry rang out.
All the Red Cloud Sect cultivators who were attacking the door suddenly jumped.
“It’s that giant eagle!” A man cried out in panic, “the same giant eagle that had ripped apart Grand Elder Huo!”
How could they not panic; before, when they had been led by Huo Xiang Lan to explore Hidden Island, things had been much smoother. A few days ago, they had come across a nest on a cliff and inside there was an immature young bird.
Although it was not fully grown, from its outstanding aura, one look was enough to tell it was not a low grade Monster Beast.
Huo Xiang Lan’s desire was stimulated, and so she flew up and captured the young bird, intending to tame and keep it, she didn’t realize that doing so would provoke a crisis. Less than half a day after catching the young bird, they were discovered by its parents; two enormous, extremely terrifying, sixth-order giant eagles.
Even though Huo Xiang Lan was an Immortal Ascension Boundary master, and dealing with a single one of these giant eagles might be possible, but when faced with two of them who were enraged at having their child stolen, under their combined attacks, Huo Xiang Lan could only hold on for less than half an hour, before being shredded alive.
(Faux: Karma is a b*tch)
At the time, Yu Xiu Ping and the others were so terrified their souls nearly left their bodies, desperately hiding in the woods and not daring to appear, let alone trying to fight. They watched as the giant eagles tore Huo Xiang Lan limb from limb, circled the skies for what seemed like forever before they slowly flew off.
Yu Xiu Ping and others thought at that moment they had escaped, but they did not expect the two beasts would be so vengeful, finally rooting them out today.
As soon as the eagle cry rang out, Yu Xiu Ping and the others felt as if they had been doused in cold water. After a moment, they heard another far off eagle cry, seeming to be responding to the previous one. Looking around, they spotted something approaching from opposite sides, two black spots which rapidly grew larger as they approached.
“Hurry, hurry up and break this stone door!” Yu Xiu Ping roared hysterically, “if we don’t open it now we’ll all die!”
Two sixth-order Monster Beasts, with their True Element Boundary cultivations fighting would be suicide, the only result would be death.
Even without Yu Xiu Ping’s reminder, how could the other Red Cloud Sect cultivators not know to increase the strength of their bombardment on the stone door? But although the stone door began to crack faster and faster, it still stood upright, blocking their way.
With the giant eagles quickly approaching, one of the True Element Boundary masters couldn’t hold down his fear of death, quickly activating his movement skill to flee.
“Come back! Junior Brother Zhang get back here!” Yu Xiu Ping roared, “If we pour in all our strength, we can break this stone door, even if you run and hide now, where will you go? “
But how could this Junior Brother Zhang be willing to stay? Swift as the wind, he ran down the mountain.
Everyone here was losing hope, and with Junior Brother Zhang as a catalyst, another cultivator began to escape, hastily shouting, “Retreat, we won’t be able to open this stone door in time, if we run now, we might have a chance!”
Finished, he hurriedly ran down.
They were lacking strength to begin with, and now two had abandoned them, the others who were left behind instantly became more hopeless.
Those who had remained till now bitterly cursed then quickly spread out, each escaping separately.
Yang Kai could only choose to tightly conceal himself, not daring to move.
Quietly looking up, he soon saw the figures of two giant eagles appear in the sky, even if they were separated by a few thousand feet, he could tell that they were both extraordinary and majestic. If he were to guess, Yang Kai estimated that they were at least 15 to 20 meters in height.
Two pairs of sharp eagle eyes glared at the fleeing Red Cloud Sect cultivators. A moment later they swiftly dove towards them.
In the next instant, a shrill cry reached Yang Kai’s ears, letting his blood run cold. Meanwhile, when the sound reached the ears of the Red Cloud Sect cultivators, every fiber of their beings trembled in fear.
He knew, someone had met a tragic end in the talons of the giant eagles.
Just as that scream came to a stop, another ran out.
A second person had been killed by the giant eagles.
A True Element Boundary master, in front of this sixth-order king of the sky, was powerless, like a newborn baby, completely incapable of resisting.
Yang Kai did not dare to breathe, desperately concealing himself in silence for a whole day, only then was he certain that the two giant eagles and the Red Cloud Sect cultivators had left, he slowly emerged from his hiding place.
His face was still holding a look of fear!
Fortunately, he had not relied on his Flaming Yang Wings to fly around, or else if he had encountered those two giant eagles, if would have been disastrous.
Frowning towards the stone door in front of him, Yang Kai examined the numerous cracks, circulating his Yuan Qi, and throwing a punch.
The stone door shook, the cracks becoming more obvious, the glowing light which encompassed it not as brilliant as before; it gave the feeling of a lamp running out of oil.
Aware of this, Yang Kai’s spirits lifted, punching even harder towards the stone door.
However, after throwing a few hundred punches, this stone door remained standing, refusing to crumble. “How strange!” Yang Kai’s brow wrinkled.
Thinking for a while, he then called out with his mind. Shortly after, a buzzing sound came; it was the swarm of insects which had followed Yang Kai.
These insects had been not far behind Yang Kai, if there was any sign of danger, he could call them out to help, but he had not thought they could be used here.
Ordering several of the giant insects forward, he let them spit out the corrosive fog onto the stone door; Yang Kai wanted to see if this strange fog could erode it.
Those few giant insects quickly obeyed, flying in front of the stone door, and then spraying out a stream of white mist from their mouths.
*Snap Crackle Pop* … bursts of cracking sounds came; the stone door really could be melted.
Seeing this, Yang Kai nodded in satisfaction, ordered the giant insects to keep spitting, then sat down to restore himself.
After a little less than an hour, Yang Kai suddenly heard a crashing noise; opening his eyes, the stone door had been broken, revealing a dark cave.
Yang Kai did not immediately rush in; instead letting a group of insects scout ahead.
Half a day later, the group of insects returned safely.
After confirming that there was no danger, Yang Kai walked forward. Once inside, he ordered the insects to guard the cave’s entrance, letting the giant insects spit out a layer of fog to block it from the outside.
With these insects on guard and the fog barrier, Yang Kai believed that even if a few of the Red Cloud Sect cultivators had escaped the eagles’ slaughter, and then returned here, they would never be able to enter.
Moving inside, the cave was not straight, but seemed to spiral downward. From in front of him, Yang Kai felt a soothing atmosphere, like the World Energy in the depths of the cave was extremely strong.
The further he went down, the stronger this feeling became.
After descending a few thousand feet, Yang Kai guessed he had come to the bottom of the solitary peak, only then seeing the end of the path.
Below him was a huge and spacious cave, the walls were dotted with a trace of light, giving it a magnificent style.
On both sides of the path, there were rows of stone shelves all with many layers, each layer holding some items.
Yang Kai walked forward, arriving in front of a stone shelf, and with the aid of the weak light observed what was on top.
“Supreme Solitary Sect” Yang Kai looked at the name inscribed on the stone shelf, recalling that he had heard about this Great Sect before. He would occasionally hear about it while he was traveling around Sea City; it was one of the few Sects in the Endless Sea Islands comparable to the Han Dynasty’s Eight Great Families with countless disciples and numerous experts, famous far and wide.
How was this great Sect related to this remote place?
On top of this engraved stone shelf there was a stone box; opening it, Yang Kai saw a piece of treasure. Picking it up, the weight was not light, this treasure was obviously made from a precious material, and he could tell, this treasure was definitely an artifact.
Examining it, Yang Kai found at the base of the artifact the words “Supreme Solitary” inscribed on it.
This really was an artifact from the Supreme Solitary Sect! But why would it appear here?
With a trace of doubt, Yang Kai set it down and proceeded to the next shelf.
This stage shelf was similarly engraved, and it was similarly another great Sect Yang Kai had heard of.
“Ancient Cloud Island!”
Although the strength of this Sect was not as prominent as the Supreme Solitary Sect, it could also be regarded as an Endless Sea Islands first-class force. This time it was a Secret Art which was placed on this stone shelf.
As Yang Kai quickly skimmed over it, he found that this Secret Art was not simple, obviously not low quality; it was at least Heaven Grade. But for Yang Kai who cultivated the True Yang Secret Art, and the Yin-Yang Joyous Unification Art, this Secret Art was unnecessary, and was also readily put back.
Continuing on, Yang Kai became even more confused.
On each of the stone shelves was the name of a great Sect, accompanied by some valuable item. There were martial skills, Secret Arts, artifacts, keepsakes, rare ancient treasures, and so forth.
These Sects were all first-class and second-class Endless Sea Islands forces, more than a dozen of them. Others like the Red Cloud Sect, a third-class force, simply were not qualified to appear on the stone shelves.
If you looked carefully, each of the items placed here really were treasures which belonged to these great Sects, but how did they all come to be gathered here?
Contemplating for a time, Yang Kai suddenly remembered something.
It was an anecdote he had heard in a teahouse in Sea City.
It was said that three hundred years ago, there was a man who visited all the great Sects in the Endless Sea Islands, hoping to worship into one of them as a disciple, but his aptitude was extremely poor, causing them all to refuse and cast him out. Some of the great Sect disciples were even crueler, directly beating him. His perseverance was admirable, eventually visiting every great Sect, but he was never successful.
Disheartened, this man despaired, but also grew to hate those great Sects for refusing to accept him, swearing to the heavens he would find another way to cultivate.
At the time, it was only a trivial matter. For these famous great Sects, how could they keep track of the countless cultivators they rejected each year, he was just one of them.
But three decades later, there was a huge uproar in the Endless Sea Islands. The Supreme Solitary Sect’s Sect Master Seal was lost. Somehow, a thief had managed to sneak into the Sect’s inner sanctum and had stolen it.
Shortly after, the news came from other Endless Sea Island Great Sects, each claiming a treasure had been taken; some of these things were very valuable while some were merely symbolic, but each of these things was their respective Sect’s Hallowed Treasure. All the great Sects were panicked, constantly on edge, fearing that this godly thief was eyeing their own Hallowed Treasure. However, no matter how prepared they were, none of them could avoid the fate of being robbed.
This string of robberies greatly troubled the Endless Sea Islands Great Sects; each of them had suffered a major loss of face. After more than a dozen Hallowed Treasures were stolen, each of these great Sects was enraged.
These great Sects gathered together, even the perennially in closed door cultivation old monsters had come out, determined to cooperate to find the whereabouts of this thief and recover their lost treasures.
Eventually, their efforts paid off. After months of investigating, these great Sects finally found some leads. There were clues that the thief, who had pilfered more than a dozen great Sects’ Hallowed Treasures, was actually a man they had all refused entry to their ranks thirty years ago.
They could not understand what kind of incredible adventure this man had encountered, to actually in such a short span of thirty years, be able to cultivate to the point where all of their Sects were almost unable to match him.
At this point, the great Sects finally understood why someone would steal their Hallowed Treasures. Originally this person was exacting revenge for rejecting him that year, wanting to give those great Sects who looked at him like a lowly dog a humiliating lesson.
The gathered masters from all the great Sects confronted this person, demanding the return of their treasures, were rejected outright, and the two sides were forced into a desperate battle.
This man fought a one-man war against the masters from more than a dozen great Sects, devastating several Endless Sea Islands, and inflicting heavy casualties to these cultivators. As for whether the thief himself was dead or alive, no one knew.
None of the masters who returned from that epic battle ever mentioned the matter.
Some people say that he was killed; others think he was seriously injured but escaped; who could say for sure?
With the passage of time, those who had participated in the war slowly died, and the incident slowly faded into history, but the Hallowed Treasures still remained lost.
Yang Kai had thought that this was just a made-up story, passed down from the older generation; after all, how many of these so-called anecdotes were there? These things were shared over food and wine, mixed in with lies and exaggerations; for every ten of these rumours, if three were based on the fact it could be considered astounding. But even these three, after being passed down by countless people, would also gradually lose their original essence, having been embellished and degraded over time.
But today, with these Hallowed Treasures on display before him, Yang Kai knew that this was not just some story, but something that had really happened.
Supreme Solitary Sect’s Sect Masters’ Seal, in the hands of the Sect Master using the Sect’s Secret Art it became a deadly artifact. But at the moment, it was placed on top of a stone shelf, covered in a layer of dust.
Ancient Cloud Island’s Supreme Secret Art, Shura Sect’s Demon Suppressing Artifact, Falling Blossom Temple’s Thousand Blossoming Blood Begonia …
Which of these was not worth as much as a city, which of these was not sacred to its respective Sect?
Even if something on these stone shelves by itself was not very valuable, since it appeared here, for those great Sects they were priceless treasures!
Unbelievably, everything that man had stolen had been placed here!
Yang Kai’s heart pounded, he could imagine, if all these things emerged again, it would cause earth shattering waves across the entire Endless Sea Islands.
“Hey, these artefacts’ grades aren’t bad. Young Master, do you want to take a few pieces? They will certainly improve your overall battle efficiency.” Old Demon asked.
There were not many artifacts here, only three in total, in addition to the Supreme Solitary Sect’s Seal which required their Secret Art to activate, the other two pieces could be refined and used by Yang Kai if he wanted to. These artifacts were both at least Heaven Grade, Yang Kai was naturally tempted.
However, once he uses these artifacts and someone who recognized their origin happens to notice, it would cause no small trouble, so Yang Kai still hesitated.
Temporarily ignoring Old Demon’s question, Yang Kai put everything back onto the stone shelves, and again proceeded further inward.
After walking for a while, a wave of rich and pure World Energy washed over his face, and not far ahead, a brilliant five coloured light radiated, fascinating him.
Yang Kai’s face brightened, instantly increasing his pace.
Rounding a corner he entered a place that appeared to be a living space, and was also where that five coloured brilliance was coming from.
Looking up, all Yang Kai saw was a wash basin size lotus flower floating in the air, surrounded by something like a water curtain, isolating this five coloured lotus from the outside.
Seemingly like water, but not water, observing it caused Yang Kai to feel an inexplicable sense of fear, like his own soul had become unstable and was panicking.
“Soul Warming Lotus!” Old Demon cried out in shock, “It’s actually a Soul Warming Lotus! My god, a Soul Warming Lotus appeared here, and it’s also a Five Coloured one! “
“Is this valuable?” Yang Kai licked his lips and asked with some excitement.
“Valuable? How could this be described as merely “valuable”, this is simply an unparalleled treasure!” Old Demon was so excited he became incoherent, “This is a Soul Cultivating Treasure, a priceless treasure that every cultivator in the world dreams of possessing. No matter how great your strength, no matter how high your cultivation, this thing has great use! Damn it, why could this old master not have found this treasure back then?”
Yang Kai coldly smiled, “So to say, you can’t take this thing?”
Old Demon’s soul shuddered, quickly saying, “Please don’t joke young master, this old servant is now only a residual soul, not to mention taking it, even touching it would could be the end of me. Being able to be accepted by it would be strange.”
“Tell me, in the end, what is the use of this thing? You can still be considered an old Devil Lord, how could this make you so undignified.”
Old Demon choked up and remained speechless for a long time, thinking to himself, [You fearless ignorant junior, you can only remain so calm because you’re completely oblivious to what this rare and valuable thing is. If you knew of its amazing use, you would be just as hysterical as this old man!]
[Damn it! Why is this old master’s luck not this good? This young master of mine’s fortune is too much! Just a few days ago he refined a trace of Heavenly-Law Energy, gaining the Heaven Soaring ability, and now he’s actually encountered a Soul Warming Lotus, is he possessed of a heaven-defying fated luck ability, to be able to come across these things one after another?]
Full of envy, jealousy, and hate, Old Demon held back for a long time to slowly calm his soul, gathered his thoughts and said, “Soul Warming Lotus, as the name suggests, is a Treasure which nourishes one’s soul with tender warmth. This means that it also helps to nourish your Divine Sense, young master understands what your soul is, correct? Although you are now only at the Qi Transformation Stage, unable to cultivate your soul, but it is, after all, still a part of you, your perception can be derived from your soul, and that is called Divine Sense. It acts as an extension of your perception. Once you reach the Immortal Ascension Boundary, you can begin to cultivate them. The more powerful your soul, the more obvious the benefits; if two similar strength cultivators fight, the one with the stronger soul will undoubtedly prevail.
Yang Kai frowned, impatiently interrupting him, “Get to the point!”
[Does this old devil think of me as a three-year-old child that needs teaching?] Although Yang Kai could not cultivate them, how could he be ignorant of what the Soul and Divine Sense were?
“Ah…” Old Demon, slightly depressed, continued, “Cultivating one’s soul is very hard, many times more than trying to enhance your cultivation or blood force, but some rare treasures can enhance the power of one’s soul, and this Soul Warming Lotus is the most supreme all those treasures under the heavens and earth. Not only is this treasure indestructible, it can never be refined, it can only be received. Once received it will reside within a cultivator’s Knowledge Sea, and without having to do anything else, it will keep moisturizing and nourishing the soul, so that it slowly becomes stronger and more solid.
“Can never be refined, will never disappear?”
“Indeed, because there is no one in the world whose soul can refine the Soul Warming Lotus, even those peak strength monsters are not an exception!” Old Demon’s tone was quite serious, “This is a very special Treasure, in terms of value, the Heaven Devouring Insect’s remains which Young Master refined a few days ago compared to it would be less than dirt because this Lotus will accompany you your entire life. From the moment it connects with you till the day you die, it will continue nourishing your soul, all the time, never ceasing, no need for you to do anything, simply allowing you to sit back and enjoy its benefits.
“This really is a wondrous thing, I want it!” Yang Kai had been enlightened, now not hesitating to rush forward.
“Wait!” Old Demon suddenly yelled, “Young master must not be so reckless.”
Old Demon was nearly scared to death; until now, Yang Kai’s attitude had been relatively apathetic, he had not expected that once his interest was piqued he would be so decisive. This abrupt change almost caught him off guard.
“What now?” Yang Kai asked unhappily.
“Young master, you can see the liquid like barrier around this Soul Warming Lotus right? Do you know what it is?” Old Demon asked.
“Hmm?”
“This is the Knowledge Sea of a supreme expert, left behind after his death! It contains the power of that expert’s soul, if young master rushes into it with your Qi Transformation Stage cultivation, I’m afraid you would be instantly killed!
“Knowledge Sea?” Yang Kai was stunned, “After death, the Knowledge Sea can survive?”
The Knowledge Sea was ethereal and invisible, the embodiment of one’s spiritual force, if one were to die then it would go out like a light, the soul naturally could not be retained.
“For others it is impossible, but for someone who had obtained the Soul Warming Lotus, preserving their Knowledge Sea is possible. This is also the strength of the Soul Warming Lotus.” Old Demon explained, “Yes, young master, if you received the Soul Warming Lotus, if you were to die one day you could also be like this.”
Yang Kai could not help looking around. When he looked down, he saw that below the Soul Warming Lotus there really was a pile of bones. This dried up skeleton was obviously the cultivator from long ago who had caused the uproar in the Endless Sea Islands.
He had died here, but thanks to the Soul Warming Lotus his Knowledge Sea had been retained.
His brow twitching, Yang Kai asked, “Old Demon, aren’t you in need of Soul Force to devour?”
Old Demon laughed happily, “It is as young master says, and if the young master has no other orders, Old Servant would like to start devouring this man’s Knowledge Sea.”
“How long will it take?”
“I’m not sure, at least a month,” replied Old Demon, “After all, when he was alive, he was not weak, plus with the aid of the Soul Warming Lotus, his Knowledge Sea should be very strong.”
“A month, good. Then I’ll keep watch!” Yang Kai nodded.
“No, young master look there, the Soul Warming Lotus is not the only treasure here”.
Yang Kai turned and saw at the bottom of the cave was a dense pure fog, gushing with energy visible to the naked eye. Since coming in here, Yang Kai’s eyes had been attracted by the five coloured lotus blossom, not paying too much attention to this.
“What is this?”
“Pure World Energy, also known as an Earth Vein! Young master’s luck is good, you can cultivate in this Earth Pulse to absorb the World Energy while you wait for Old Servant to refine this Knowledge Sea, and then receive the Soul Warming Lotus.
“This is an Earth Vein?” Yang Kai was stunned, that thief from three hundred years ago really had found a wondrous place to cultivate, no wonder it only took three decades to reach a state where the Endless Sea Islands Great Sects were helpless against him.
Here there was not only the Soul Warming Lotus to help, there was this Earth Vein here too.
“This is a very small Earth Vein, and will dry up soon,” said Old Demon.
“It’s fine, you go about your task, don’t concern yourself with me.”
The Old Demon, with great joy, bound himself to the Soul Breaker Awl and flew out with haste. Crashing into the Knowledge Sea, he started to frantically consume it and Yang Kai could even hear the satisfying sound of sipping. It was as though a lustful ghost who was living in a desert had finally found a beautiful, stark naked woman.
When Yang Kai immersed himself in the Earth Vein, it was like bathing in World Energy, his whole body felt comfortable, without needing to run his cultivation technique, his body’s millions of pores naturally absorbed the surrounding Qi, every inch of flesh and drop of blood was refreshed.
Obtaining this rich and pure World Energy, Yang Kai was overjoyed.
Sitting cross-legged, running his Secret Art, he was like a fish in water, devouring the energy of the Earth Vein.
The reason that thief could use only thirty years of time to cultivate to a realm where he was a headache for every Endless Sea Island Great Sect, one was due to the Soul Warming Lotus, the second was this Earth Vein.
The former for his soul, the latter for his body, sitting on these two supreme treasures, not rapidly enhancing his strength would be strange.
Unfortunately, this really was just a small Earth Vein, the World Energy it contained was not too large, combined with it having been constantly used for three decades, the World Energy in this Earth Vein was running out, and was about to dry up.
But even so, for the present Yang Kai, it was still a great help.
His body was peculiar, allowing him to absorb this World Energy much faster than that year’s thief. The Golden Skeleton was simply a bottomless pit, no matter how much energy was absorbed into it, it could all be swallowed; there was no fear it could not handle it.
Additionally, the World Energy in the Earth Vein was extremely pure, making it easy to refine. Simply drawing it into his meridians then circulating it for a few breaths of time was sufficient. It could then be absorbed into the Unyielding Golden Body, adding to Yang Kai’s strength.
While Yang Kai was absorbing the Earth Vein’s World Energy, Old Demon was busy swallowing the remnant Knowledge Sea, the two did not interfere with each other, completely content in their cultivation, gradually forgetting the passage of time.
After a full month and a half, Yang Kai slowly breathed out and opened his eyes.
After Yang Kai had unscrupulously cultivated in this small Earth Vein for so long, it had completely dried up and the dense World Energy was fully dissipated.
Carefully checking his current realm, Yang Kai revealed a satisfied face.
Without him knowing, his cultivation had risen to Qi Transformation Ninth Stage, with just one more step, he could break through to the Separation and Reunion Boundary.
And Yang Kai could feel, his Yuan Qi, be it in quality or quantity had already reached a level of a Separation and Reunion cultivator, all he was lacking was a crucial accumulation of martial arts sensibility.
Every great realm promotion required a cultivator to acquire a certain amount of insight. When Yang Kai had broken through from the Initial Element Stage to the Qi Transformation Stage it was so; now to break through to Separation and Reunion Boundary he would also need to consolidate his sensibility.
But since Yang Kai did not have such accumulated sensibility, acquiring it would depend on his opportunities and luck; it was not something relentlessly cultivating could achieve.
Lifting his eyes, he saw that Old Demon had already completely absorbed the Knowledge Sea remains surrounding the Soul Warming Lotus, and was now idling around bored, waiting for him to finish cultivating.
Staring at the Five Coloured Soul Warming Lotus in front of him, Yang Kai slowly stood up, and walked towards this supreme soul nourishing treasure.
“Old Demon, is there anything I should pay attention to?” Yang Kai asked.
“No, if young master had already reached the Immortal Ascension Boundary and had started to cultivate his soul, it may have been necessary to wrestle with it somewhat, but as young master is currently, you can simply receive it now.”
Since there was nothing to pay attention to in particular, Yang Kai did not hesitate anymore and directly reached out to the Five Coloured Soul Warming Lotus, only just touching it with his fingers before it disappeared.
At the same time, Yang Kai suddenly felt his whole existence being refreshed. His mind became many times clearer than ever before, even his perception was enhanced.
Involuntarily, Yang Kai took a deep breath, as his body completely immersed itself in a warm comfort and shivered.
He could not sense any trace of the Soul Warming Lotus no matter how carefully he checked, but Yang Kai knew that it had certainly entered his mind and only after cultivating his soul would he be able to see it again.
“Haa… a Five Coloured Soul Warming Lotus… ” Old Demon sighed, full of envy and jealousy.
“Haha.” Yang Kai laughed loudly.
“Young master, in the future, if you can find some Soul nourishing Precious Treasures, and allow this Soul Warming Lotus to absorb them, one day evolving it into its Seven Coloured form , the benefits you receive from it will be even greater.”
“It can evolve?” Yang Kai asked, amazed.
“Of course, when a Soul Warming Lotus is born, it only has one color, it can be thought of as its grade, the more colours it has, the higher the grade, the higher the grade, the more powerful the benefits it brings to a cultivator. As a simple example, if a Single Coloured Soul Warming Lotus needs a hundred years to double the strength of a cultivator’s Knowledge Sea, then a Five Coloured Soul Warming Lotus would only need twenty years, while a Seven Coloured Soul Warming Lotus would take just five years!”
“Incredible!” Yang Kai was shocked, although he had not cultivated out his soul, he was well aware of just how difficult it was. As Old Demon had said before, cultivating one’s soul was more than a hundred times more difficult than cultivating one’s realm, but now with the Soul Warming Lotus’ aid, he no longer had to worry about this; he could do nothing and his soul would simply become stronger and more solid over time.
“So to say, this Five Coloured Soul Warming Lotus is an amazing find.” Yang Kai was completely satisfied. This treasure was still a heaven defying existence; it would be ridiculously ungrateful to be disappointed that it was not Seven Coloured.
“Naturally this is an amazing treasure. Just wait until it evolves into its Seven Coloured form and then it will truly be a world-shaking treasure! But this thing grows very slowly and only by absorbing the energy of Precious Treasures that enhance the soul, so if young master wants to evolve it into a Seven Coloured Lotus, I’m afraid it will be quite difficult.”
“This can be a consideration for later, no need to force things now!” Yang Kai remained calm, if in this life he could evolve it into a Seven Coloured Lotus, then it would happen eventually, if not, then that was that, getting anxious and forcing things would be useless.
“It’s good if young master can think like that.” Old Demon openly admired him. Being so young, and yet able to remain calm and collected, the more he observed Yang Kai, the more his feelings of admiration grew.
If it were some other youngster, this sinister and worldly old devil would have long ago been able to manipulate him. But faced with Yang Kai, Old Demon did not dare to scheme, always showing the utmost respect for him.
“Let’s go.” Yang Kai took a deep breath. He had stayed here for more than a month, he received the Soul Warming Lotus, and sucked clean an Earth Vein; the benefits had all been swept away, naturally, he had no reason to remain.
Before leaving, Yang Kai dug a grave and buried the bones of the thief.
On the way out, passing by the stone shelves again, Yang Kai hesitated for a long time, wrestling with the ideas and impulses inside him to take these treasures away, he finally managed to leave.
There were three artifacts on the stone shelves, aside from the Seal which could not be activated; Yang Kai could make use of the other two. But seeing how the old thief did not use them, there must certainly be a reason.
Perhaps once he used these things, those Endless Sea Island Great Sects would be able to perceive them through some special method. This was not Yang Kai’s own speculation, but simply a fact. Many great Sects would place a seal or prohibition on their important artifacts, so that over a certain range, any unauthorized use could be detected. Yang Kai had intended to return to Sea City after this, naturally he did not dare refine these hot potato.
[First leave these here, when I’m ready to leave the island I can return for them.]
Climbing up a few thousand feet, Yang Kai came to the top of the solitary peak. The insects were still diligently guarding the broken stone door, and there were no signs that the Red Cloud Sect True Element masters had returned; they had all probably been killed by the two giant eagles.
Ordering the giant insects to retract the fog blocking the exit, Yang Kai went out.
Standing on the solitary peak, Yang Kai looked around.
It was ten thousand miles from here to Sea City, and if he wanted to leave the island, he could only rely on his Flaming Yang Wings, but using them required massive amounts of Yuan Qi. After all his recent battles, the Yang Liquid remaining in his dantian was less than thirty drops, nowhere near enough to support him flying this distance.
Flying the ten thousand mile distance was just one problem, once he encountered a storm at sea, he would need to go around to avoid it, causing his Yang Liquid consumption to be even greater.
[I have to save at least four hundred drops of Yang Liquid in order to leave this damned place!]
Four hundred drops, would Hidden Island have so many Yang type Precious Treasures?
Yang Kai felt somewhat depressed, but in any case, looking for Yang type Precious Treasures, and increasing the Yang Liquid in his dantian was his priority.
Ordering them to re-block the cave with their fog barrier, Yang Kai also left a lot of insects to guard here, while taking the other half out to explore.
After some time, Yang Kai’s search for Yang type Precious Treasures was quite fruitful; in just four or five days, the Yang Liquid stored in his Dantian had reached more than a hundred drops.
Equipped with his Yang Origin Seal, within three thousand feet of him, no Yang attribute Precious Treasure could escape Yang Kai’s search.
Yang Kai was not anxious, on the whole Hidden Island, the only living human was probably him. In addition to those powerful Monster Beasts, Yang Kai could somewhat be regarded as the master of this island.
Exploring and collecting everywhere, if he encountered a Precious Treasure, it would be harvested. If it was Yang attribute he would convert it to Yang Liquid, if it was some other property then he would pack it up and store it for later.
When he occasionally encountered an exotic flower being guarded by a Monster Beast, Yang Kai would instruct his insects to attract its attention, then sneak in and pick it, always minimizing his risk.
The map he had received from Madam Jiang was also a lot of help. Before, Yang Kai did not know what the dark markings on certain locations of the map meant, but when he inadvertently entered such a place, he met a sixth-order Monster Beast, suddenly understanding, those dark marked places were obvious warnings about danger zones.
Since then, Yang Kai had been careful to avoid these marked areas, and really did not encounter much trouble.
Traveling far and wide, in less than half a month, Yang Kai had explored the entire island, and had harvested all the Precious Treasures he could find, all of which had been packed into his now giant sack.
These were good things, all of them Earth Grade and Heaven Grade; it was at least ten times the harvest compared to the one he had obtained on the Red Cloud Island peninsula.
Yang Precious Treasures were also plentiful, but until now, Yang Kai’s dantian still only held about three hundred drops of Yang Liquid.
Three hundred drop of Yang Liquid; if his luck was good, he might be able to reach Sea City.
But it was only a chance, Yang Kai was not certain.
If he ran out of True Yang Qi while mid-flight and fell into the sea, he would end up dead, even if he didn’t drown, the Sea Monster Beasts would eat him alive.
He had to find more Yang type Precious Treasures, enough to have four hundred drops, in order for his plan to be foolproof.
A couple days before in one of the danger zones, Yang Kai had sensed that there was a Yang attribute Precious Treasure, but since it was one of the marked areas on the map, he had not dared to explore it.
But now it seemed like he had no choice. He had scoured the entire island and harvested everything he could find, if he wanted to accumulate four hundred drop of Yang Liquid, with the exception of that danger zone there was nowhere else to look.
The only question was what kind of Monster Beast stood guard there.
He had to be extremely careful, if the guardian was similar to those two giant eagles from before, even if Yang Kai used his Flaming Yang Wings he would have no hope of escape.
After spending a whole day, he arrived at the periphery of the danger zone.
Yang Kai had planned thoroughly, ordering the insects to do some preparatory work, while he carefully speculated about any possible situation that might arise and what countermeasures to take deal with them. Only once he had agonized over all this did he begin to take action.
The Yang Origin Seal in his chest reacted, a few thousand feet in front of him there was indeed a Yang Treasure, and the grade was not low, if its contained energy was enough, then refining out the last hundred drops of Yang Liquid would definitely be possible.
He had to risk it now, so Yang Kai hardened his resolve, and fearlessly walked step by step under the guidance of the Yang Origin Seal.
There seemed to be a bloody smell in the air, and everywhere traces of a Monster Beast could be seen, all signs of the great danger in front.
After closing the first thousand feet, the bloody smell became thicker, and Yang Kai could faintly see a huge dark red rock standing not far in front.
The Yang Qi that his Yang Origin Seal sensed was definitely being emitted by this stone.
Yang Kai was ecstatic. Suddenly, the hope of reaching home was within his reach. Such a large piece of Yang property stone, if he could absorb all of its Yang Qi, then cobbling together four hundred drops of Yang Liquid would be easy. This stone should be similar to the Yang Flame Stone mined by Bloody Battle Gang, but compared to the Yang Flame Stone its quality was much higher.
Continuing to move forward carefully, Yang Kai saw that at the bottom of the rock, there was a shallow cave, and inside the cave was an awe-inspiring Monster Beast, its pair of purple eyes staring at his own.
Yang Kai heart suddenly jumped, he did not expect his whereabouts to be exposed to easily.
But the Monster Beast did not seem interested in coming out to attack Yang Kai. Instead just lying in the cave, staring aggressively at him.
This was its home; it was its only place of rest and safety. Without it, the Monster Beast knew that it would die; chased to death. Unless it was a last resort, it would not leave.
Once he had approached to within three hundred feet, the Monster Beast let out a loud roar, its purple eyes also flashed a brutal light, warning him to stay away.
It slowly stood up, and stepped out of the cave.
It was only now that Yang Kai could see its true body. This Monster Beast had an appearance similar to a giant wolf, but its body was covered in dark red fur. It stood twenty feet tall and its mouth was full of razor sharp teeth, glaring towards Yang Kai while baring its fangs.
An invisible pressure surrounded him, leaving Yang Kai almost breathless.
Sixth-order Monster Beast! This was absolutely a sixth-order Monster Beast, definitely not any weaker than the previous two giant eagles. For such a Monster Beast, even if Yang Kai gave his all, it would still be impossible to kill it.
Slowly bending down, while observing the movements of the Monster Beast, Yang Kai picked up a stone at his feet.
Immediately, he threw the stone toward the Monster Beast.
Such a blatant provocation completely enraged the dark red wolf beast; next, all Yang Kai saw was a red light flash in its eyes and then this Monster Beast had already crossed the three hundred foot distance between them, appearing right in front of him.
[So fast!] Yang Kai went pale and without the slightest hesitation, he quickly turned around and activated his movement skill, quickly retreating.
The sound of wind came from behind. The Monster Beast was closing in rapidly, causing Yang Kai’s hair to stand on end. An icy chill running down his spine, he pushed his speed to the limit, constantly flashing out.
“Young master, it’s no good, it’s going to catch up!” Old Demon cried out in panic.
“Then help!” Yang Kai did not have time to think about anything else, simply flying forward. Old Demon quickly rushed into the Soul Breaker Awl and transformed into a black streak flying towards the wolf beast.
The Monster Beast’s response was quick, actually opening its mouth and biting the Soul Breaker Awl.
Old Demon was terrified and cried out in fear. Fortunately, this wolf beast was unable to chew through the Soul Breaker Awl, and surprised by this unusually hard object, it quickly spat it out.
But Old Demon still had a lingering fear.
With this short delay, Yang Kai finally opened some distance.
After dashing out about 300 meters, finally arriving at the location of his previous layout, Yang Kai no longer ran away, instead turning and staring at the Monster Beast, watching it swiftly close in on him, its mouth full of fangs reflecting a brutal light.
Kicking his feet, Yang Kai’s body flashed and reappeared a few dozen feet away.
Without waiting for him find his footing, the wolf beast had already rushed over, its’ speed not much slower than the Heaven Devouring Insect. Right now, Yang was under immense pressure, having to constantly display his movement skill to barely avoid it.
At that moment Old Demon finally attacked, distracting the wolf beast’s attention from Yang Kai, slightly alleviating his embarrassing situation.
One man, one demon, and one wolf beast, over a radius of several hundred feet, continued this deadly play. Several times, Yang Kai was almost eaten alive, always just barely escaping mortal danger, but even so, Yang Kai was covered in cold sweat.
With his Qi Transformation Ninth Stage cultivation, to deal with a sixth-order Monster Beast, it was truly a foolish endeavour. If not for his superb movement skill, he would have long been killed by this Monster Beast.
But in order to be able to leave this island, Yang Kai had to take this risk.
After a full stick of incense worth of time, Yang Kai looked around, revealing a grin, summoning his Flaming Yang Wings and soaring into the sky.
“Old Demon, you keep it busy along with the insects, I’m taking off!” Yang Kai called out, turning towards the direction of the big Yang stone.
“Please hurry young master; Old Servant is really afraid it will swallow me.” Old Demon was dismayed, though he was safely hidden inside the Soul Breaker Awl, if it was really to be swallowed by this wolf beast it would still be frightening.
The Monster Beast glared towards the direction Yang Kai had flown, and as if it was aware that this human wanted to occupy its home, it could not help letting out a terrifying roar and raced out.
But it had not run for long when it encountered a strange fog.
Dashing into it, a burst of sizzling noise rang out, followed by the wolf beast crying out miserably, rushing back, and fearfully staring this white mist barrier in front of it.
This fog really lived up to Yang Kai’s expectations; even this sixth-order Monster Beast could not freely enter it, the strong corrosiveness enough to stop it in its tracks.
But this wolf beast was clever, knowing how lethal this fog as, it quickly changed direction, trying to rush out the other side, but it soon discovered it had been surrounded. This several thousand feet radius area had at some point been wrapped by this strange fog, leaving no way out, no door to the heavens, no path for the living.
This was Yang Kai’s plan all along, letting those giant insects set up this fog barrier in advance here, deliberately leaving a small gap, leading the wolf beast inside, and after the closing the gap, he could then use his Flaming Yang Wings to calmly leave.
From beginning to end, he did not have any intention to kill this powerful sixth-order Monster Beast, nor did he have this ability, trapping it was the best he could hope for.
*Sha Sha Sha*
From below its feet came a burst scratching sounds, the whole ground trembling, and then suddenly, countless insects burst out and began fearlessly attacking the wolf beast.
The wolf beast roared in anger, its whole body spewing flames. Any insect that got close was quickly roasted and fell to the ground.
Old Demon did not dare to approach it, only floating around endlessly, disturbing the wolf beast’s attention.
On the other side, Yang Kai flew to the large Yang stone, reaching out and placing his hands on it, he frantically circulated his True Yang Secret Art, swallowing the Yang Qi into his body.
This giant Yang property stone was significantly higher quality than those Yang Flame Stones. No wonder the wolf beast decided to cultivate here, this stone would also be of great benefit to it.
Surging Yang Qi flowed into his body, and in the blink of an eye, his meridians swelled up.
*Drip*
A drop of Yang Liquid formed, sinking into his dantian.
*Drip, Drip*
Yang Kai felt like in his life he had never heard such a pleasant sound, the Yang Liquid in his dantian increased by a drop seemingly every second.
Three hundred and twenty drops, three hundred and fifty drops, three hundred and eighty drops …
After about a hundred breaths, Yang Kai had accomplished his goal, and he had only taken a small part of the Yang Qi in this giant Yang property stone, barely having absorbed one tenth of its total store.
But Yang Kai did not stop here, still circulating his True Yang Secret Art.
The wolf beast howling soon rang out even louder, the cry mixed with anger and murderous intent, it was, after all, a sixth-order Monster Beast, Yang Kai did not know how long that fog barrier could delay it. If it ruthlessly ignored its own injuries and charged out, nothing he had come up with could block it.
In just a short time, Yang Kai had already condensed five hundred drops of Yang Liquid in his dantian; this number was absolutely enough to support his flight to Sea City.
At that moment, a black gas suddenly flew over to him; it was the Soul Breaker Awl, and Old Demon anxious yelled, “Young master, you have to escape now, that guy decided to rush out!”
Before he even finished speaking, Yang Kai saw a red figure rapidly approaching, it had already escaped.
The wolf beast was covered in burning flames. It had used this layer of flame to resist the fog barrier’s corrosion, allowing it to leave while only suffering some minor injuries.
A thousand feet, five hundred feet, three hundred feet…
The wolf beast was like the wind.
Acting decisively, Yang Kai released his Flaming Yang Wings again, and as the wolf beast was about to reach him, he quickly flew into the sky.
Looking down, he could see the wolf beast’s pair of purple eyes staring into his own, a furious roar constantly emitting from its throat.
Yang Kai grinned, “Thank you! In fact, I did not take much of your stones’ Yang Qi, only about two-tenths, there’s no need to be so upset right?”
As if it could understand what Yang Kai had said, like it had somehow gotten a great deal and should be grateful, the wolf beast became even angrier, roaring out again and again.
Yang Kai no longer bothered dealing with it, maintaining his Flaming Yang Wings also consumed a lot of True Yang Yuan Qi; fluttering his wings, he quickly left.
The wolf beast also understood, knowing that it could not catch this flying enemy, it naturally did not chase
Arriving at his previous location, Yang Kai picked up his sack filled with Precious Treasures, and led the surviving insects towards the direction of the solitary peak.
Two days later, Yang Kai came to the solitary peak and entered the cave. He then removed everything on the stone shelves one by one. Not daring to refine them now, he also would not leave them here.
If he could use them, they would be of great help in the future! Now that he had enough Yang Liquid, it was at last time to leave this island.
Across the Endless Sea, a fast flying figure could be seen, on that figures’ back, there were two bird-like wings, but this pair of wings, were made entirely of bright burning flames, soaring past, even the air seemed like it was burning.
Yang Kai had left the island a day ago; for an entire day and night he had been flying, his hands carrying two big sacks, one parcel held all the Precious Treasures collected from the island, the other held the items from the stone shelves.
Holding these two heavy packages of things while flying was not a pleasant experience. There were several times Yang Kai was tempted to simply throw them into the sea, but eventually, he could not bring himself to do it.
His dantian’s Yang Liquid was depleting quickly due to the Flaming Yang Wings’ Yuan Qi consumption being enormous. After only a single day’s effort, he had already used nearly two hundred drops of Yang Liquid; if not for his relentless preparations, Yang Kai would definitely not have had enough to support him all the way back to Sea City.
He had also left the insects behind on the island; although these insects were very obedient, and also had many useful abilities, Yang Kai could not think of a way to take them away, and was reluctantly forced let them stay.
The Endless Sea lived up to its name, the blue waves rising and falling beneath him seemed to join together with the infinite blue sky, letting people give birth to a feeling of being lost in this vast expanse, helpless to escape and an anxiety that develops into fear.
The good news was that it had been good weather all day; the storms Yang Kai had worried about were nowhere in sight.
Having flown for so long, Yang Kai was really exhausted, the harsh wind blowing in his face made it feel numb till the point he thought it would fall off. Although his physical consumption was serious, his spirit was not tired. Yang Kai guessed that this was related to him receiving the Soul Warming Lotus. With this supreme Heaven and Earth Treasure constantly sustaining his soul, naturally, he wouldn’t feel fatigued.
Yang Kai inspected the horizon, and saw the outline of an island about fifty miles ahead of him, he became excited, quickly turning towards it and flying over.
Shortly after, he touched down. With the Flaming Yang Wings, crossing this amount of distance was nothing.
Landing on it, Yang Kai saw that this piece of land couldn’t really be called an island, more like a few square feet in area rock, which had somehow emerged from the sea.
Not caring in the slightest, Yang Kai threw down his sacs and collapsed onto the rock, unable to move, gasping for breath.
After a long rest, Yang Kai finally recovered some of his strength, his hands rubbing his face, slowly restoring feeling to it.
“Don’t worry young master, you have not even reached the True Element Boundary, once you do you can use your True Qi to protect your body, then flying long distances will not be so difficult.” Old Demon comforted.
“Now I understand why those below the True Element Boundary who have flying artifacts refuse to use them easily, it really is uncomfortable.” Yang Kai clicked his tongue.
“Actually, young master’s performance could be considered exceptional, if you had not earlier refined those few blood clotting beads, substantially increasing your own blood force, it would have been impossible to hold on for so long.”
After spending the greater part of a day restoring his physical strength, Yang Kai set out again.
It was another day and night before he saw the distant sight of land appear again.
However, the Flaming Yang Wings on his back stood out too much, and the two sacs he was carrying had many things which could not be exposed, otherwise, it would provoke a life and death catastrophe. So Yang Kai deliberately searched for a remote location and determined no one was around before landing.
Checking himself, his dantian now only had a few dozen drops of Yang Liquid left. In these past two days of time, he had spent more than four hundred drops of Yang Liquid; this kind of consumption, if he had not over prepared earlier, he would never have made it.
Looking around, Yang Kai was not familiar with this place, but it should not be far from Sea City, because on the Red Cloud Sect’s ship, every day he would observe their route, so when he left the island, he was simply retracing his steps.
Searching for a long time, he finally found the main road.
Yang Kai was covered in dirt, his clothes torn and damaged, he looked no different from a poor street beggar, but the two sacs he was carrying were definitely eye-catching. If he encountered some bandits along the road it would likely be troublesome.
Walking along the road, he eventually came across a small teahouse and managed to ask the old couple in charge for directions, finally having some idea of where he was heading.
From here to Sea City was around a thousand miles.
After confirming where he was, Yang Kai re-opened his Flaming Yang Wings and flew in the direction of Sea City.
Once there, he would settle all his unfinished business and grudges!
After an hour or so, Yang Kai arrived near Sea City, choosing not to go directly into the city, but instead finding the seaside hut where he had first met the old man and Xiao Yu.
The front door was broken and the sea breeze was blowing into the house, making it unusually cold.
Walking inside, Yang Kai found that the interior of the house was exactly the same as it was that night he was taken; obviously, the old man and the silent little girl had left everything when they had fled.
That night he had left the old man with a lot of silver coins, enough for him and the little girl to live their entire lives without worry. As long as they were careful, they shouldn’t experience any suffering later.
Looking for a safe and secluded place nearby, Yang Kai carefully hid the two sacks, only taking an Earth Grade Mid-Rank herb along to exchange for some silvers.
One day later, Yang Kai appeared in Sea City.
With no immediate purpose, he just went around to inquire about any useful news. A few days later, Yang Kai had a firm grasp of current events, returning that night to the broken seaside house.
After three days, Yang Kai took action; his goal, the Red Cloud Sect! Although the deaths of the three Jiang ladies had little to do with the Red Cloud Sect, they were nonetheless somewhat related, not to mention, Yang Kai and the Red Cloud Sect had irreconcilable grudges. On top of all that, the silent little girl’s parents were also likely killed by the Red Cloud Sect.
One night passed as he quietly flew about, arranging some things.
Now all he needed to do was wait and watch the show.
Early morning, Ancient Cloud Island.
Disciples woke from their cultivation and performed their duties, dealing with the island’s various chores.
As an Endless Sea Islands first-class force, Ancient Cloud Island occupied more than three islands, compared to the Red Cloud Sect, whether it was its heritage or the quality of its disciples, they were all several times better.
Relying on the resources produced from these three islands, their disciples were doing quite well, producing several once in a hundred years geniuses, and even though they were not on the level of those monsters from transcendent factions like the Supreme Solitary Sect, they were indeed prominent and well-known, with few people daring to provoke them.
However, the disciples of Ancient Cloud Island all knew a secret that could not be discussed in the Main Sect. It was that three hundred years ago, the Sect had lost its supreme Secret Art and to this day it had not been recovered.
Every Endless Sea Island Great Sect had a similar secret.
But young people were always curious about such things, and the wind would often leak through the cracks, nothing could remain hidden forever. One person passed it to two, those two would pass it on to three more, private discussion was filled with such chatter, everyone was aware that it was only in front of the elders that this matter must not be mentioned.
Zhong Miao was only a Common Disciple within Ancient Cloud Island, her aptitude was nothing special; after having stayed on the island for several years she was now a Qi Transformation Stage second stage.
She lived in a remote place on Ancient Cloud Island and was responsible for feeding a few peacocks that also lived there. These peacocks were the favorite pets of one of the Island’s Elders, and usually, she had nothing to do in addition to taking care of them and cultivating diligently. She was well aware of her own mediocre aptitude, and if she wanted to receive the same treatment as those geniuses of Ancient Cloud Island, that would be more difficult than ascending to the heavens.
She did not blame anyone, instead just doing what she could on her own.
Waking up in the morning, Zhong Miao opened the door as usual to feed those obviously more important than her peacocks, but after only stepping outside, she saw a dagger inserted into her door with a letter hanging beneath it.
[That’s strange, who would write me a letter here?]
Zhong Miao felt puzzled, but still reached out and removed the letter. Scanning it with her eyes, she saw that there was a message written on it stating, “Ancient Cloud Island, Island Lord, Elders or above!”
Zhong Miao suddenly pursed her lips, thinking this was one of her fellow disciples playing a trick on her.
This kind of thing has often happened in the past. With her low status, lack of contacts, and average looks, there was always some annoying Senior Brother or Senior Sister who would bully her for fun.
But this letter’s line of text was too strange, actually saying it was for the “Island Lord, Elders or above.”
[Since this is supposedly for the Island Lord or the Elders, why would it be inserted into my door!?] Zhong Miao breathed heavily, feeling some grievances, those people were really too annoying.
Feeling quite annoyed, she eventually opened the letter and took out what appeared to be an old yellow page from some book.
Looking over it, she whispered, “Broken Moon Transformation Art?”
Reading these words, she was momentarily stunned.
[Why does this name sound familiar? And this yellow page looks at least hundreds of years old, like some antique.]
“Broken Moon Transformation Art?” Zhong Miao whispered again, a piece of information gradually appearing from the depths of her mind, her eyes suddenly went round and her face filled with shock. She was unable to keep her hands from trembling as if this old yellow page had suddenly become burning hot.
[Isn’t… isn’t this the name of our Sects’ supreme Secret Art?] She had privately heard some rumors saying that three hundred years ago the Sect had lost its Secret Art, and it was called the Broken Moon Transformation Art.
Some days ago she had heard from the Elder who had come to see the peacocks himself that if they still had the Broken Moon Transformation Art, those talented Senior Brothers and Senior Sisters cultivation the speed would be significantly faster.
[Is this real or fake?] Zhong Miao suddenly became flustered, almost wanting to cry.
Looking at the yellowed page, she quickly put it back into the letter, then, even refusing to take care of the peacocks, she dashed off towards the Main Sect.
On her way, she met a few annoying senior disciples, but now Zhong Miao didn’t have the mind to pay any attention to their ridiculing words.
After running more than a dozen miles, she finally came to the master of those peacocks, Han Chao, Han Elder’s residence.
But before she could enter, she was stopped by two Senior Brothers.
“What is it?” One of them asked coldly.
Zhong Miao took a few deep breaths, slowly collecting her thoughts, she did her best to calmly reply, “Two Senior Brothers, I want to see Elder Han, I have something important to report.”
Although her status and cultivation were low, she understood the importance of this matter, and obviously would not discuss news about the Broken Moon Transformation Art lightly.
However, that Senior Brother only sneered, “Elder Han is in retreat, no one shall disturb him.”
“But I really have a matter of utmost urgency to tell him.” Zhong Miao had felt so anxious she was afraid she might die while rushing over here, but she was being coldly rejected by this Senior Brother.
“Aren’t you that little girl who feeds the peacocks, what important matter could you possibly have?” The other person chuckled; obviously, he was looking down on this Junior Sister.
Zhong Miao puffed her cheeks and glared towards these two Senior Brothers, but they refused to relent, insisting on making life difficult for her. Thinking quickly on her feet, she summoned some unknown courage from within her, cupped her hands over her mouth, and yelled loud enough to be heard miles away, “Elder Han, it’s terrible, all your peacocks have died!”
P.s – he used his ‘Yang Liquid’ to fly over since self built, unstable boats with a monster lurking in the waters would not exactly be the best of ideas :/
The girl’s voice was crisp and penetrating, coupled with the fact that it was early morning and this was the Elder’s residence, causing the surroundings to be relatively quiet, Zhong Miao’s call really could reach ten miles away. All the nearby Ancient Cloud Island disciples had heard her clearly.
The two Senior Brothers, who had stopped her out front, both turned white, and their stomachs flipped. It was a miracle they did not collapse on the spot.
All the Ancient Cloud Island disciples walking or cultivating nearby were stunned for a moment, then suddenly fled as fast as possible. Zhong Miao’s cry was like the opening of a great slaughtering array, causing everyone to desperately run away.
Doomed, Elder Han’s peacocks actually all died, that was like Elder Han’s reason for living had died! Although these peacocks were only common beasts, they were saved and cared for dearly by Elder Han’s wife. When his wife had died the love he felt for her was placed upon those peacocks, often visiting them personally, his attitude towards them was similar to how a parent would care for his children.
But now… they were all dead!
Every Ancient Cloud Island disciple who heard that sentence could imagine just how enraged Elder Han would be. A fire in the city gates is also a calamity to the fishes in the moat (Bystanders will also suffer if they get involved), if they did not flee now they would definitely not be spared from the Elder’s wrath.
“Why you little… little… sister, do you know what you’re saying?” The Senior Brothers who had been blocking Zhong Miao were terrified and incoherent; they also wanted to run, but they could not summon the courage.
“Who dares speak such nonsense!?” A roar from Han Chao’s residence came. The next moment, a white-haired old man shot out from the inside, falling in front of Zhong Miao and the two Ancient Cloud Island disciples, it was Elder Han Chao.
Looking at his face, it was as if Elder Han’s eyes had gone red. He appeared only wearing his nightgown and a pair of socks, apparently, he had not bothered to change clothes or even wear his shoes before dashing out. Instantly, the pressure of an Immortal Ascension Boundary master fell upon Zhong Miao and the two disciples, causing them the tremble in fear.
Han Chao’s eyes were full of murderous anger. Sweeping over the three here, his eyes fixed on Zhong Miao, sternly asking, “What happened to this old master’s peacocks?”
Zhong Miao was scared half to death and did not dare to speak, instead of bowing her head and presenting the letter in her hands to Elder Han.
Han Chao looked suspiciously at this female disciple responsible for feeding his peacocks, grabbing the letter and taking a deep breath to suppress the anger in his heart, he pulled out a yellowish book page, casually skimming its content.
Only a moment later, Han Chao’s was suddenly dumbstruck, like a quail which was caught outside in winter with no place to hide. His whole body trembled non-stop, a hoarse sound caught in his throat, like a bone he had swallowed had gotten stuck on the way down; for a long time he was incapable of even a whisper.
The two male disciples saw this scene and were covered in cold sweat, everything was over, the impact of the death of his peacocks was obviously not small on Elder Han, enough to make this Immortal Ascension Boundary master’s soul stagnate, for a long time being unable to recover.
“Elder Han …” Zhong Miao weakly called out.
Han Chao suddenly woke from his stupor, quickly shoving the yellow page back into the letter. Angrily stomping, he harshly reprimanded Zhong Miao, “Such an important matter, why did you not report it sooner!?”
The two male disciple’s hearts jumped as they quietly retreating a few steps, fearing they would get involved. They quickly looked towards Zhong Miao begging her for mercy with their eyes.
But Zhong Miao took this chance to vent all her grievances, “I only found this when I woke up today, I then ran here as fast as possible but these two Senior Brothers refused to let me inside, so I was forced to yell just now!”
“Elder, we had no idea…” The two male disciple’s legs went soft, quickly kneeling down to beg for mercy.
Han Chao couldn’t be bothered with them, his body flashing as he disappeared.
Zhong Miao and the two disciples were stunned, unsure what to do next.
But before they had time to breathe a sigh of relief, Han Chao suddenly returned. His gaze sharply landing on Zhong Miao again, he asked in a serious voice, “Have you discussed this with anyone else?
Zhong Miao quickly shook her head.
“Good! You’ve done well, come with me!” Han Chao grabbed Zhong Miao by the arm and once again disappeared.
After waiting for a long time, the two kneeling disciples finally dared to slowly get up, looking at each other, silent and confused.
[Had Elder Han… lost his mind? His peacocks had died, how come he had praised Junior Sister for doing a good job? Shouldn’t he have harshly punished her?]
[Also, with how Junior Sister shouted just now, I’m afraid the whole Ancient Cloud Island will soon know; how was this not discussing with anyone?]
In Ancient Cloud Island, Island Lord’s residence, Zhong Miao was kneeling in the hall, her surroundings were silent and there was no trace of people in sight.
After Han Chao had brought her here he no longer paid any attention to her, but Zhong Miao knew that all the Island Elders and Guardians had rushed to this hall.
She did not know what this group of old people had gathered together to discuss.
After waiting for a full half-day, this group of elders emerged wearing solemn faces, leaving here one by one until finally only Elder Han Chao and Ancient Cloud Island, Island Lord Gu Feng remained.
The two walked over to Zhong Miao, where Gu Feng kindly said, “Stand up.”
“Disciple dares not!” Zhong Miao lowered her head even further.
Gu Feng smiled, laughing, he threw something in front of Zhong Miao, gently saying, “Keep this token, visit the Pill Hall and take any pills you feel you need, then go to the Cloud Spirit Cave for closed practice.”
Zhong Miao’s whole body shook violently, quickly looking up at Gu Feng in disbelief.
Cloud Spirit Cave! It was the best cultivation ground with the richest World Energy in the whole Ancient Cloud Island. Cultivating there was three times as efficient as practicing elsewhere and only the most talented and outstanding Senior Brothers and Senior Sisters, those who carried the hopes and expectations of the Elders, were allowed to enter. For a mediocre disciple like her, she did not dare to even dream of one day being able to enter.
But now, the Island Lord actually personally told her to enter closed practice in the Cloud Spirit Cave?
In addition, she could go to the Pill Hall and ask for any pills she wanted? And shockingly, the token in front of her was the Island Lord’s Order, having this was like having the Island Lord’s authority, allowing her to mobilize any and all Ancient Cloud Island disciples she required.
“There is no doubt that this is what you deserve.” The Han Chao who had never even said a kind word to her before, at the moment was now smiling at her, his face filled with kindness, like a doting grandfather. However, Han Chao also said in a serious tone, “But remember that today’s matter, no matter who asks…”
“Disciple will not breathe a word.” Zhong Miao was not a fool; naturally, she understood how to answer.
Han Chao nodded with satisfaction, waving his hand, “Good! Go on.”
“Many thanks, Island Lord, many thanks, Elder Han!” Zhong Miao said full of joy, feeling like today she had simply won at life. All she had done was find a letter on her door, but she had actually gained such huge benefits.
Who was the mysterious benefactor who had bestowed her such great fortune? He had not even left his name. In the future, how would she find him to repay the favor?
Picking up the Island Lord’s Order, Zhong Miao left the hall, almost feeling like she was floating through a dream.
At high tide on Ancient Cloud Island, some shrewd disciples were surprised when they noticed that the island’s masters were hurriedly gathering together, secretly preparing for something as a thick sense of tension floated around them.
At Midnight, many experts from Ancient Cloud Island had assembled, proceeding to board a great ship and set sail.
On this great ship, Ancient Cloud Island had a full two hundred masters. The Island Lord personally led this expedition, along with four Great Elders, and three Sect Protectors, in addition, there were countless True Element masters. The weakest cultivators here were still at the Separation and Reunion Boundary.
In addition to a few of the top leadership who knew the truth, everyone else was confused.
On the second day, at dawn, the great ship approached an island.
“Isn’t that Red Cloud Island?” Someone recognized it.
“What are we doing here?”
Red Cloud Sect was only a third-class force, and while not comparable to the strength of Ancient Cloud Island, it was regardless, still a Sect. The Endless Sea Island Sects generally developed independently, not interfering in each other’s business; nobody had thought the goal of their voyage was actually this Red Cloud Island. Did they travel all this way just to fight with Red Cloud Sect?
Gu Feng’s was a burly figure with sharp eyes, he gave off a seasoned and solid atmosphere standing at the bow, loudly shouting, “This lord has received word, that my Ancient Cloud Island’s lost three hundred years ago Broken Moon Transformation Art, is currently inside Red Cloud Sect.”
Broken Moon Transformation Art!
The ship exploded into uproar, this was Ancient Cloud Island’s supreme Secret Art, lost three hundred years ago, still lost to this day, how would it suddenly appear in the Red Cloud Sect?
Gu Feng apparently did not want to explain too much, continuing on, “Today, we will search the Red Cloud Sect, and retrieve the Broken Moon Transformation Art, completing my Ancient Cloud Island Ancestor’s final wish. If anyone resists, kill without mercy! If anyone talks back, kill without mercy! Today’s war is for my Sect’s Broken Moon Transformation Art, if you can retrieve it, you shall be recognised as Ancient Cloud Island’s heroes!”
“Land!” Gu Feng roared decisively, signalling towards the island. Seeing this, the masters aboard the great ship quickly flooded onto Red Cloud Island.
Only moments later, mournful screams from Red Cloud Island rang out, mixed with loud cursing and the sounds of battle. Right now was daybreak, the time when people were most lax, with Ancient Cloud Island’s launching a sneak attack, coupled with their unparalleled momentum and overwhelming strength, how could the Red Cloud Sect possibly resist?
Only the two remaining Grand Elders offered any real resistance, but they still fell to the combined forces of the Ancient Cloud Island Elders.
The Red Cloud Sect’s Sovereign and Elders were unable to fight back, quickly being eliminated. The Ancient Cloud Island masters ran rampant, crushing anyone who got in their way.
This day, Red Cloud Sect was filled with rivers of blood and mountains of corpses. Of the Sect’s disciples, more than half had fallen, and anyone above Separation and Reunion Boundary had been slaughtered.
“Found it! Found it! I’ve found it! HA HA HA!” Han Chao’s hands trembled when he searched the body of a Red Cloud Sect Elder and found a yellowish ancient book. No doubt, it was Ancient Cloud Island’s Broken Moon Transformation Art.
Hurriedly bringing this supreme Secret Art back to the ship, he handed it to Gu Feng.
Ancient Cloud Island’s Island Lord shed tears of joy, trembling, “The heavens bless my Ancient Cloud Island! Our three hundred-year-old wish has finally been granted, my Ancient Cloud Ancestors, you can now rest in peace.”
Han Chao agitatedly asked, “Island Lord, how should we deal with the remaining Red Cloud disciples?”
“Kill!” Gu Feng coldly declared. With just one word, the fate of the Red Cloud Sect was sealed.
Regardless of how the Broken Moon Transformation Art had ended up in the hands of the Red Cloud Sect, and no matter how many people had actually read this Secret Art, they all had to die, only then could they be sure no outsider would know the Sect’s secrets. In order to maintain the sanctity of Ancient Cloud Island’s supreme Secret Art, so what if they slaughtered an entire island?
(ED: Karma is a b*tch. When they were kidnapping ppl and forcing them to their deaths, they didn’t foresee that day coming)
However, Gu Feng had some suspicions; namely, who was the mastermind in the dark behind all of this. This person was sophisticated, and obviously had some kind of grievance with the Red Cloud Sect, so he or she had borrowed a knife to kill, and had deliberately revealed the location of the Broken Moon Transformation Art.
Or else how would things be so coincidental?
But even if Gu Feng clearly understood all this, he had no choice but to follow this script and be an executioner. This matter was simply too important to Ancient Cloud Island.
Who was this person? With such thorough and ruthless means, they were really not to be overlooked.
At the same time, at a restaurant in Sea City, Yang Kai was sitting by the windows, holding a glass of wine, looking toward the direction of Red Cloud Island, completely indifferent.
Sipping his drink.
Yang Kai had been sat here from morning till evening, not moving an inch.
The war on Red Cloud Island’s also took place from morning to evening, most of their disciples slaughtered; only a few fish escaped the net.
The results were overwhelming, Ancient Cloud Island had brought two hundred people, and with only thirty or so wounded, they had destroyed a third-class Sect. This price was definitely worth it.
When night fell, Yang Kai paid a few silvers, and slowly left the restaurant.
All he did was leave the Broken Moon Transformation Art on the Red Cloud Sect, and then take its title page to Ancient Cloud Island.
Nothing more!
Flipping his hand, the Red Cloud Sect had been destroyed!
Sea City, Thousand Gold Revelry Floor.
This was a place to seek pleasures, the local brothel, filled with girls dressed to seduce, beckoning and inviting. Their clothes left nothing to the imagination yet retained a graceful style, escorting patrons upstairs by the arm, laughing and flirting the whole time.
Outside the gate, there were many enchanting girls blatantly soliciting guests, from time to time there would be some dignified well-dressed people pulled into the store.
Half the street was filled with sweet and immoral incense.
When Yang Kai came to the Thousand Gold Revelry Floor, just as he was about walk in, a seventeen or eighteen year old girl came up to him. This girl had delicate features, and appeared slightly pale, but it did not detract from her beauty.
The seductive maiden’s eyes beckoned, skillfully laughing, she performed an elegant greeting, “Welcome, Young Lord!”
Her voice was crisp and sweet, causing Yang Kai’s eyes to shine.
Thinking back, since the incident on the island with Yu Ao Qing, where he had forcefully suppressed his desires, quite some time had passed. And with the increase in his cultivation, his dual cultivation art’s influence had also grown. Now, with a willing girl in front of him, of course Yang Kai couldn’t help his mind wandering.
Here, as long as one had money, it was fine to do whatever they wanted, free of moral constraints; everyone was a willing participant, each getting what they desired. It was transaction, after a night, no one would give it a second thought; it was a perfect place to vent frustrations.
But the thought of this seemingly pure girl having been tasted by an unknown number of people suddenly dulled Yang Kai’s enthusiasm.
The young girl quietly read the mood, smiling sweetly she asked, “Is this Young Lord’s first time?”
Yang Kai blushed and said, “Of course not.”
Although she was young, this girl had been in this line of work for some time now, and her vision was quite sharp, naturally she would not expose Yang Kai’s lie, instead only stepping forward, stretching out a jade like hand and lightly holding Yang Kai’s arm saying, “If Young Lord wants to have some fun, perhaps Little Servant can be of service, hmm?”
Yang Kai nodded his head up and down, a bit awkwardly.
The young girl laughed and led Yang Kai inside. While they walked, he rich breasts intentionally or unintentionally brushed past Yang Kai’s arm.
With her stimulus, Yang Kai’s breathing became a little heavy, and the more certain the girl became of her guess, this really was this Little Lords first time coming to such an establishment.
Stepping into the inner hall, a gust of hot air blew past. Since it was a brothel, the interior decoration was obviously somewhat suggestive; the surrounding walls all featured stimulating murals, and the screens, tables, and chairs of the lobby were adorned by many fanciful patterns.
Yang Kai’s gaze wandered as he was shocked.
[*Gulp*… who knew there were many strange and incredible… methods!]
[Well, when I go back to High Heaven Pavilion, I must find Su Yan and try these out.]
The lobby was filled with sensual noise, some people blatantly molested the girls’ chests, others engaged in a passionate kiss, still more would push their hands under the girls’ clothes, wantonly groping, breathing heavily, the moans of pleasure ringing in the ears of everyone.
Yang Kai was so over-stimulated that his face went red.
The young girl drew closer, standing on tiptoe, her lips lightly whispered next to Yang Kai’s ear, “Young Lord, do you want to eat or drink, or perhaps, you’d like to spend some time alone with Little Servant in her room? Anything you’d like, please just ask.”
“It’s a bit noisy here.”
“Then Young Lord should come with me!” The young girl chuckled and pulled Yang Kai’s hand towards stairs leading up.
On the third floor, spotting an empty room, the young girl pulled Yang Kai gently.
“Since this is Young Lord’s first visit, Little Servant will arrange some refreshments to be sent over.” The young girl coxed in an intimate and gentle voice.
“Please wait.” Yang Kai abruptly said.
The young girl smiled, covering her mouth flirtatiously, “Is there something the matter Young Lord?”
Yang Kai shook his head and said, “No, it’s just … I prefer older women.”
The young girls surprised a moment, but did not get annoyed, everyone had their own preferences, even if she had not met a hundred men she had at least met eighty, many people had their own special hobbies.
“Then shall Little Servant call you an Elder Sister?” The girl sweetly consulted Yang Kai.
“No need, call your proprietress over instead.” Said Yang Kai.
The young girl was suddenly dumbstruck.
She had seen many guests, but no one had ever mentioned such a request. The brothel’s proprietress, although when she was young was also a companion girl, but with the passing of time, fewer people were interested in her. Because no guests wanted her to accompany them, she had instead become a “manager”.
The young girl hesitated, “Young Lord, are you sure you want to request our den mother?”
“Just call her!” Yang Kai hurriedly threw her silvers.
The young girl nodded, “Then would Young Lord please wait a moment, I do not know whether Mama is willing, I’ll have to ask.”
[This Young Lord, he does not seem very old, how is his preference such old women? Our Thousand Gold Revelry Floor’s Mama is already more than 40 years old, the difference in their age must be similar to a mother and son, this fetish is a bit too extreme isn’t it?]
However, if a guest wanted this kind of woman it was his freedom, the young girl would naturally not block business for the Thousand Gold Revelry Floor, as long as he paid there was no other concern.
After Yang Kai waited for a moment in the room, the door finally opened; looking up, he saw somewhat hefty woman wearing thick makeup walk in.
When she was young she should have been quite pretty, but now that she had aged and her body had become plump, the charm of her youth had given way, leaving only some excess fat around the navel region.
Having just heard that young girl say there was a young master who wanted her to accompany him for some wine, the proprietress was naturally happy, and had quickly rushed over.
When she came in and saw he was actually a young handsome little brother, she was even more elated. [This Old Lady still has some charm after all.]
Stepping inside, she gave a charming smile while displaying her appeal, courteously greeting, “Young Lord …”
She had not finished speaking when suddenly Yang Kai reached out to her, and shoved her into a nearby chair.
*Thunk*
A sharp dagger was suddenly inserted in front of her.
The proprietress’ face suddenly became pale, shifting her eyes towards the dagger, trembling in fear.
“Young Lord, what do you want?” This woman was not a fool, she immediately understand that Yang Kai was not here for pleasure but instead to make trouble.
“I have something to ask you.” Yang Kai pulled up a chair and sat down in front of her, his voice icy cold.
“Please ask Young Lord, if this servant knows anything she will not hide it.” The proprietress panicked.
“Three or four months ago, did you buy a roughly thirty year old woman?” Yang Kai narrowed his eyes toward the proprietress.
She quickly responded, “Young Lord please be more specific, this servant is not quite clear what you mean? Women are often sold to this business.”
“She was sold here by the Miao family.”
The proprietress’ face twitched slightly.
Yang Kai stare harder into her eyes and continued, “She also ruined her own face, swearing to die, and then was sold to the Red Cloud Sect! Can you remember now?”
The proprietress shook her head, “No Young Lord, this servant does not remember such a person…”
Yang Kai’s hand swiftly flew out and a crisp sound was heard; the face of the proprietress now suddenly had a dark palm mark.
“It’s true…”
Another slap struck her face.
“Young Lord…”
*Slap!*
“This humble servant did not lie to you!”
*Slap!*
“Humble servant remembers.” The proprietress could only endure a few slaps, her face now swollen and her eyes dull, several of her teeth had also been knocked out, if she continued to insist, she would probably suffer a living death. This young man in front of her was obviously a vicious and ruthless cold blooded warrior, how could an ordinary person like her resist?
“There was such a woman, but her body was not defiled, and her face was ruined by her own hand, it had nothing to do with our business.”
“I know.” Yang Kai nodded slightly and asked, “Then, who was it that beat her and forced her to receive guests?”
“That… it…” The proprietress was now trembling; she had never imagined that that beautiful woman would have such a terrifying background.
“Who was it!?” Yang Kai pulled out the dagger in front of her and mercilessly pried off one of her fingernails.
“It was this servant, Young Lord mercy, please have mercy, I only whipped her a few times, whenever a new girl is sold to the floor, if she won’t cooperate, she is always disciplined so. This unworthy servant did not know she was one of Young Lord’s people, if this servant had known, even in the face of death she would not have dared to harm her.” The proprietress quickly got on her knees, kowtowing repeatedly, smashing her head onto the floor.
Yang Kai took a deep breath and with a cold gleam in his eyes, placed the dagger on her neck.
“Please, please don’t kill me!” The proprietress screamed in terror, “This servant has told you everything she knows, I beg you, spare my life!”
As her voice faded, the dagger in Yang Kai’s hands drew a circle, blood splashed, and the proprietress’ eyes gradually dimmed, her body falling softly to the floor.
Wiping the blood from the dagger, Yang Kai got up and left the room, slowly walking out.
The young girl who had led him inside came up to Yang Kai, gently smiling, “Did Young Lord enjoy himself?”
Yang Kai ignored her, this attitude surprised the young girl and she could not help quickly running up to the third floor room she had left him, pushing the door open, what she saw was the bloodied floor, and the proprietress body lying limp on the ground.
A piercing scream rang out and the whole Thousand Gold Revelry Floor suddenly plunged into chaos.
Sea City, Miao Family’s bustling, well-lit manor.
Miao Hua Cheng had settled in Sea City not too long ago, but he was a man of some cunning and ability and had obtained some small success. He married a girl from the Shang family, fathered a few children, set down roots, and these years had developed his family quite a bit. Although the family could not be considered large, every year they could still harvest two or three thousand silvers, so Miao Hua Cheng had no need to worry about food or clothing, and could live in relative ease.
In particular, in recent months, Miao Hua Cheng felt that his fortune had increased substantially, all because of the huge harvest he had obtained.
For starters, Madam Jiang had brought a large number of her family’s valuables along with her, so the Miao Family’s property had essentially doubled overnight. Soon after that, when he contributed the mysterious tortoise shell to the Red Cloud Sect, the Red Cloud Sect Elders personally promised to cultivate his son Miao Lin in the future, and also give Miao Hua Cheng some cultivation pills.
With his son’s future being secured, Miao Hua Cheng felt sincerely grateful and happy, even for a matter as important as the Hidden Island expedition, the Red Cloud Sect had promised to bring Miao Lin along, it was clear how pleased they were with him.
In addition to all this, Miao Lin once told him that in the future he would take a girl named Yu Ao Qing as his wife, and once he succeeded, Miao Hua Cheng felt that their time to rise would be at hand. From his investigations, he knew that this Yu Ao Qing was the only daughter of a Red Cloud Sect Elder. If his son really managed to conquer her, the Miao Family’s future would be much brighter.
The only thing that made him regret was that Madam Jiang’s resistance that day had been too strong and he had actually failed to ensnare her. Thinking back on her plump white body, her dignified and beautiful appearance, Miao Hua Cheng couldn’t help feeling frustrated. If he could have just held down his anger at the time, not selling her to the Thousand Gold Revelry Floor in a fit of rage and instead allowed her to remain by his side, he was certain that she would have eventually submitted to him, becoming one of his playthings.
After all, she was just a woman. All he needed to do was bed her, make her comfortable, and then she would never want to leave.
Later, when Miao Hua Cheng went to the Thousand Gold Revelry Floor, he heard from the proprietress that Madam Jiang had actually disfigured her face, and refused to work the floor, so she was forced to sell her to the Red Cloud Sect.
[Hmph, falling into the Red Cloud Sect’s hands, how could her end be good?] Miao Hua Cheng sneered; she didn’t appreciate his kindness, so this was her fate.
Sipping his wine, Miao Hua Cheng laughed happily, his other hand holding one of his maidservants, wantonly enjoying all her body’s various curves.
To his left was another beautiful maid pouring wine for him. With his recent surge in wealth, he had acquired these two from the Thousand Gold Revelry Floor. Both of them were beautiful, glamorous, and seductive, Miao Hua Cheng had spent all his recent days tossing around in bed with them.
Even now, the three people were sitting on his bed, a small table set with a few exquisite dishes placed nearby. Miao Hua Cheng was dressed in his nightwear while the two maids were practically naked; only wearing some thin sheer cloth covering their important parts, over eighty percent of their soft tender skin was exposed, fully displaying their elegant waists, slender legs, full breasts and round bottoms, painting an amorous picture.
Celebrating as he drank, Miao Hua Cheng from time to time groped and pinched these two maid’s bodies, his eyes gradually blurring with lust as his mood became aroused.
“Remove the table, your master has some new tricks to teach you!” Miao Hua Cheng waved his hand, clearly drunk and bothered.
The two maids stood up and quickly removed the table and wine.
“Hahaha, come come!” Miao Hua Cheng beckoned them over, not even waiting for them to walk to the bed before he reached out and pulled them over.
The two young girls fell onto the bed as their clothes were stripped.
Miao Hua Cheng quickly arranged them next to each other, throwing off his own clothes before pouncing towards them like a starved dog, but just as he was preparing to ravage their tender bodies, a burst of mournful screams came from outside.
This noise caught Miao Hua Cheng completely off guard, almost causing him to jump up in surprise.
Soon hearing an angry shout coming from beyond his door, “Bold little brat! How dare you run wild on our Miao Family’s property!?”
As soon as this voice faded, Miao Hua Cheng heard a loud scuffle; his guards all roaring as they rushed the intruder, apparently engaging in a vicious battle. Miao Hua Cheng, however, did not rush out, instead carefully listening to and analyzing the situation, frowning a moment later when he found that the intruder was extremely strong, seemingly slaughtering his guards one by one with ease.
Yang Kai had wrapped himself in black clothes and broke into the Miao Family’s home, carrying only a steel knife in his hands, and every time his knife flashed, another person would die!
This was only a small family force and not a Sect with many disciples; many of the guards here were people who had reached the end of their Martial Path and had given up trying to advance, instead deciding to work for these small forces in order to earn a living.
The Miao Family was a new, weak force, so how could it possibly attract any truly strong cultivators?
Over the past few days, Yang Kai had carefully inquired about everything related to the Miao Family so he knew that their greatest expert was only at Peak Separation and Reunion while amongst the guards there were a few other Separation and Reunion cultivators, but most of their ranks were filled with men at the Qi Transformation Stage.
All of these people were mediocre at best, needing to cultivate for more than twenty or thirty years to reach their current realm and were no longer able to break through. They were merely hired by Miao Hua Cheng to act as guards and thugs to improve his prestige.
When he broke in, Yang Kai was easily discovered by the guards as he made no attempt to hide himself, but after exchanging only a few blows he was untouched while several dead bodies now lay on the floor.
His cultivation had now reached the Qi Transformation Stage Ninth Stage, and his realm alone was much higher than most of the Miao Family’s guards. Not to mention, Yang Kai was enraged with his Yuan Qi rioting about, filled with a dense murderous aura; he was like a demon that had descended upon them with his crimson eyes flashing a malevolent light.
The thick Demonic Qi he was emitting caused many of the Miao Family guards to tremble in fear.
Against the Red Cloud Sect, Yang Kai had to borrow the help of Ancient Cloud Island, but for this Miao Family, Yang Kai was determined to finish them himself, after all, only when one settled their own grudges could the knot in their heart be truly solved.
“Brat, who are you, to have such strength at such a young age, you must be a disciple of some great Sect right?” One of the Miao Family’s Separation and Reunion Boundary guard leaders asked.
To reach Peak Qi Transformation Stage at such an age, this kid had to be an elite disciple of one of the Endless Sea Island Sects; the small family forces of Sea City were definitely unable to cultivate such a monster, so all the guards were really afraid, any one of these Endless Sea Island forces was not something the Miao Family could afford to provoke.
If they killed this young man and provoked someone they should not mess with, then his end would definitely not be good; although he had taken Miao Hua Cheng’s silver and decided to work for the Miao Family, his life was definitely worth more to him.
However, this kid was very strange, since he entered till now he had not spoken a single word, just cutting down anyone who he came across, it made people feel like he was just a raging fire. No matter if he had suffered some injustice or debt, if he was trying to slaughter the Miao Family, there had to be a reason, right?
“Young man, to which Sect do you belong? Why can’t you tell us?” This person was cautious, deciding to ask again before he acted.
Yang Kai remained indifferent; gripping his blood-stained knife, he simply continued walking forward step by step.
[Bastard!] Yang Kai’s attitude completely provoked this Miao Family’s guard leader’s anger, prompting him to yell, “Kill him!”
“What if he really is an elite disciple of an Endless Sea Island Great Sect?” Some of the guards still hesitated.
“Look at his thick Demonic Qi, even if he was some elite disciple before, he’s definitely fallen into madness already, how could those Sects care about such a man?”
What this man said made sense; Yang Kai had broken in, not said anything, did not answer their questions, and instead just started killing people, if this was not madness then what was?
Cutting down evil demons, that was everyone’s duty and responsibility!
Having concluded this, the Miao Family’s guards no longer hesitated, the few Separation and Reunion Boundary experts they had leading the charge as they attacked this invader.
Yang Kai waved his hand as a black gas flew out, the steel knife in his hands flashing brightly, slashing at a Qi Transformation Stage guard in front of him.
The other side tried to use his own sword to parry, but as soon as their weapons made contact, his sword’s blade flew out. With his hot True Yang Yuan Qi flowing through it, Yang Kai’s knife was superheated, not only slicing through his opponent’s blade but also easily splitting its wielder cleanly in half.
Blood rained as guts splashed onto the floor.
Two Separation and Reunion Boundary experts tried to approach him, but before they could get close, their ears were filled with a strange evil laughter. This eerie sound seemed to seize their souls, like some hidden master was beside them, observing their every action.
This caused both of them to freeze, no longer able to summon the courage to attack Yang Kai, allowing Old Demon inside his Soul Breaker Awl to attack them from the front.
In the darkness of the night, Old Demon was quite well concealed, but sensing the approaching crisis, the two Separation and Reunion Boundary experts quickly tried to resist, a series of sharp clashes ringing out before Old Demon was blown away.
Flying out, the Soul Breaker Awl flew towards the front of the courtyard where it pierced a Qi Transformation Stage Fifth Stage guard’s chest, quickly passing right through him, taking away his soul in the process.
On the Red Cloud Island’s right peninsula, Old Demon had devoured a lot of Demonic Qi and had also consumed a great master’s remnant soul power, all of which greatly increased his combat capabilities. So now, using a single blow to kill a Qi Transformation Stage was really quite easy, not to mention, he was currently sunk into the Soul Breaker Awl, using his soul to drive this high-grade artifact, for most people it was nearly impossible to prevent.
While Old Demon was flying about, Yang Kai killed two more Qi Transformation guards. Seeing how ruthless he was, how could the other Qi Transformation cultivators dare come forward? The only ones still capable of fighting back were the three Separation and Reunion Boundary cultivators, but even they were gradually suppressed by a combination of Yang Kai and Old Demon’s attacks, their bodies now drenched in sweat.
The three people exchanged a look, their resolve becoming firm, angrily shouting, “Little brat, die!”
The three experts attacked together and Yang Kai parried their blow with his steel knife. While he held them off, Old Demon fearlessly flew in from the side and launched a counterattack.
With a sharp clang, Yang Kai’s steel knife broke under the combined attacks as the Separation and Reunion experts were forced back several steps, but before they could regain their footing, Yang Kai had dashed up to one of them and ferociously punched towards his chest.
*Peng Peng Peng…* Three muffled sounds rang out as this man coughed up blood.
A single blow had caused him serious injuries; the power of the Burning Sun’s Three Layer Blast could clearly be seen.
Before the two could recover and rush to his aid, Yang Kai had already withdrawn as Old Demon immediately attacked this guard. With his whole body’s Yuan Qi in chaos, the Soul Breaker Awl easily pierced his throat, stuck in his body for a moment, and then flew out again.
“Ha ha ha! Finally, this old master has a decent soul to eat!” Old Demon’s laughter rang out, accompanied by a burst of chewing sounds.
The two remaining Separation and Reunion Boundary guards despaired, and before they could collect themselves, in the blink of an eye, Yang Kai who had been several tens of meters away had somehow appeared directly in front of them.
His glowing red fists, like two burning hunks of iron, flew towards their chests.
The two let out a roar, ferociously urging their Yuan Qi, pushing out their own palms to counter this attack.
*Pa Pa* Two dull thuds were heard.
Yang Kai felt a shock run through his arms and was forced to retreat, but his two opponents did not fare any better as a sharp pain invaded their palms and a highly aggressive Yuan Qi flooded into their bodies.
Not daring to underestimate this attack, they hurried to resist, trying to resolve this invading Yuan Qi, but ultimately failing to do so.
Three pulses of Yang Yuan Qi, like overlapping waves, rushed into their meridians and burst, turning their arms into a bloody fog.
The guards screamed in pain but Yang Kai had already launched his next attack. Using his movement skill, he appeared directly behind them and launch a ferocious barrage of punches.
*Peng Peng Peng…*
The two Separation and Reunion experts flew out like rags. Caught off guard, they ate several hard fists before they managed to escape, but their bodies were once again flooded with True Yang Yuan Qi.
Their faces flashing in panic, the two of them desperately circulated their Yuan Qi again trying to resolve this hot Yuan Qi.
However, not a moment later, Old Demon once again rushed in and launched a surprise attack, swiftly depriving the two guard leaders of their lives.
Damn! We are finally here! Chapter 200!