Pan Yun's face was deathly pale, but her movements were decisive. She transformed every last scrap of spiritual power into sealing talismans and hurled them down at it one after another.
The spirit realm lunged left and struck right, its white jade lotus petals swelling as though it was about to explode its way out. But Pan Yun refused to yield...
This was clearly inside her Mud Pill Palace. One misstep and she would either become an idiot or lose her life outright, yet she acted like a barefooted person who feared no one in shoes.
The Spirit Being had slept for many years and had finally awakened. It truly did not want to fall asleep again, much less die. A magical artifact gaining sentience was one chance in ten thousand; becoming sentient had already used up all the luck of its life. It did not dare take the risk.
It could only give up confronting Pan Yun head-on, abandon its original body, exhaust its energy, and burst out of the talismans' encirclement. In an instant, it rushed out of Pan Yun's body.
A streak of spiritual light shot out from Pan Yun's forehead and, with a whoosh, sank into a nearby plum tree. Pan Yun's eyes flew open. She thrust out her right palm, and a talisman formed of spiritual power appeared in her hand. She swiftly slapped it toward the plum tree...
The Spirit Being wailed miserably. As the talisman fell, it fled from the plum tree without even looking back and quickly plunged into a cat not far away.
The moment it entered, it wanted to run, only to discover that this was a dead cat. Even its legs were broken. The moment it stood up, it flopped back down.
Seeing the approaching figure, the Spirit Being burst into tears and shouted, "You have no martial virtue! We agreed to cooperate, yet you went back on your word!"
Pan Yun had already exhausted her spiritual power. As she walked, she refined the vital essence within her body, waiting for spiritual power to form so she could draw another talisman. Yet she revealed none of this. Instead, she stopped before it and spoke nonsense. "When did I ever agree to cooperate with you?"
It meowed furiously, but Pan Yun could understand it. "You agreed just now!"
Pan Yun said, "When I responded, I meant that I understood. I did not agree to cooperate with you."
The entire cat stiffened. Thinking back, that was indeed true. She had only said "oh" and had never explicitly agreed to cooperate.
The cat—oh, no, the Spirit Being—was furious to death.
Once the vital essence was refined, it turned into spiritual energy and fell into her Dantian. She immediately mobilized it. A talisman appeared in her hand, and she raised her palm to strike it down. The entire cat screamed, "If you seal me, you will lose my help—"
"In my previous life, you never awakened in the research institute, yet we could still use you. You merely had many abilities sealed away, but we could still read the information that had already been unsealed. You are too troublesome when awake. You should continue sleeping."
The Spirit Being let out a piercing shriek and tried to persuade her further, but the talisman had already pressed toward it. It instantly lost its voice. Then a furious roar suddenly rang out. "Stop!"
A force then struck her. Pan Yun flew backward and slammed into the ground with a bang.
The cat was scooped up by a hand, and it instantly froze stiff.
Pan Yun felt as though all five viscera and six bowels had shifted out of place, but she did not dare cry out in pain. The moment she hit the ground, she scrambled up quickly and looked at the person who had suddenly appeared with bloodshot eyes.
A young man in a blue-gray Daoist robe held the black cat in his arms, frowning at her. Seeing how small she was, looking only six or seven years old, he froze. "She is actually so young?"
Then he grew angry. "So young, yet already so vicious. Truly born bad to the bone! Let me teach you a lesson."
As he spoke, he raised his hand to strike, only for another hand to seize his. "Wait!"
Without betraying anything, Pan Yun took two steps back. When she saw the second person appear, every hair on her body stood on end. She sensed danger.
The second person also wore a blue-gray Daoist robe, but she was a young woman. Her entire bearing was cold, and her eyes were even colder. After her gaze swept over Pan Yun, she looked straight at the open ground behind her. "You killed someone."
The certainty in those words made Pan Yun's heart pound wildly.
The young man sized Pan Yun up and down, frowning. "Junior Sister, your judgment must be wrong. This child looks only six or seven. Killing a cat would already be difficult for her. How could she kill someone?"
The young woman said coldly, "Eight. Are you blind? There is such a large patch of blood on her body."
The young man's gaze sharpened. "That is not blood from abusing a cat..."
He paused. How could one cat have so much blood?
He examined Pan Yun anew, his expression growing uglier and uglier. "What a vicious little brat. Could she be a fake child? A dwarf? Or does she possess some cultivation art that lets her shrink?"
The young man became much more cautious. Holding the cat, he stepped forward one pace at a time and gently sniffed. The smell of blood grew stronger and stronger, and his face darkened further.
Such a heavy stench of blood—had someone been tortured to death?
Pan Yun retreated step by step along with his advance, frantically refining the vital essence inside her body. But she had not eaten much today. Her stomach was empty, and her whole body had already reached its limit.
Though spiritual energy drifted through the air, there was very little of it. She could only desperately seize at it to absorb even a small amount.
She drew closer and closer to the plum tree. A little closer, just a little closer, and she could...
Just as she was about to hide beneath the plum tree, a figure rushed at her like lightning. Pan Yun was greatly alarmed and struck with a wave of her hand. Her last remaining spiritual power split into two. One portion transformed into a silver-white blade of light that shot toward the young woman's neck with a whoosh; the other let her retreat swiftly, and with another whoosh, she slipped into the plum tree.
Just wait a little longer, just wait a little longer, until I refine more vital essence and spiritual energy...
[Take me with you...] A weak voice rang out in her mind. It was the Three Jade Spirit Realm, whose original body still remained in her Mud Pill Palace.
Pan Yun snorted coldly in her heart. [Take you with me so you can absorb my spiritual power again?]
If not for it, would she have spent eight years cultivating only to pinch and scrape whenever she used even a little spiritual power?
The Spirit Being said, [All things have spirits; plants and trees are no exception. The plum tree you are in has vital essence. It will be faster than absorbing spiritual energy from outside. You must comprehend it—imagine that you and the plum tree are one...]
Pan Yun's heart stirred. She calmed her mind and sensed the tree. For eight years, her cultivation had not advanced an inch, but she had never given up. After being struck down again and again, she had developed the good habit of entering meditation quickly.
It was the same now. As she drew infinitely close to the plum tree, she sensed it continuously drawing energy from the earth. Her feet seemed to become tree roots as well, drawing in energy together with it. At the same time, she felt its pulse. She "saw" green energy flowing through the tree...
Pan Yun did not hesitate. She reached out to seize it, but after grabbing only a little, the tree suddenly shuddered, throwing half her body out.
The young man attacking the plum tree was greatly startled and cried, "Junior Sister, your judgment really was right! She truly was hiding inside the tree—she did not escape!"
Pan Yun flashed away to run. She had absorbed very little energy, so she formed a hand seal and chanted silently, gathering the spiritual energy in the air. She wanted to burrow into the earth and leave, but the instant her feet touched the ground, someone grabbed her and lifted her up.
The young woman swiftly tapped Pan Yun's body several times. The spiritual energy Pan Yun had gathered immediately dispersed. Her meridians were blocked, and the energy within her instantly scattered as well.
Pan Yun: ...
The one large and one small silently stared at each other.
Pan Yun: This was not martial arts. Like her, this woman knew spells—and could interrupt her spells too.
The young woman was also certain now. Pan Yun truly knew strange arts. The spiritual energy that had gathered moments ago instantly dissipated into the air, filling the surroundings and diluting the smell of blood enough that breathing became easier for her.
The young man rushed over with the cat in his arms and took Pan Yun from the woman's hand. Then he shook her in midair.
Pan Yun was shaken so hard that her head spun. The young man cried out in surprise, "Junior Sister, look! She has not changed. She really is human, not some spirit creature."
A new book is starting! Thank you, fellow readers, for your support all this way. Everyone is welcome to save it and read!
Before you continue