Dao Sect Bi Sheng

Xu Yunfan released Li Miaoyun and tossed her aside. After confirming that she was incapable of acting, he quickly walked over to Li Haomiao. Looking at the wound in his chest that had pierced through his heart, he could not help clicking his tongue.

"You survived even that?"

Li Haomiao rolled his eyes.

"Can't you say something nicer?"

After a pause, Li Haomiao said quietly,

"Thank you. Without you, I'm afraid I would have had no way out."

Xu Yunfan waved a hand. "No need for that. I only stepped in because that woman was already at the end of her rope. If she'd been in perfect condition, you could only have prayed for your own luck."

That woman was far too strong. With just a trace of qi cultivated through the External Three Harmonies, she could contend with someone in the Blood Refinement Realm, while he had only reached mastery after a single practice.

He could not beat her. There was simply no way he could beat her.

Most importantly, Li Miaoyun's final words had held him back. If Li Haomiao could not stop her, then both he and Fang Mushan would die.

As for Fang Mushan, Xu Yunfan glanced at him, still trapped in the snow some distance away. Fang Mushan had exerted himself the hardest just now, but had accidentally sunk deep into a snowdrift. Even now that the battle was over, he was still struggling and unable to climb out.

Hearing this, Li Haomiao slowly closed his eyes.

Xu Yunfan's expression shifted slightly. He looked at the motionless Li Haomiao, then reached out and poked his stomach with a finger.

Li Haomiao opened his eyes. "What are you doing?"

"I want to cut open your stomach and see whether there's anything good left inside."

"..."

Li Haomiao barely managed to raise a hand and place it on Xu Yunfan's shoulder.

"I think I'm running out of steam."

Xu Yunfan's face tightened. "Don't die yet. Pass the Rising Sun One Qi Art to me first!"

"..."

Li Haomiao really wanted to curse, but he could not muster the strength anywhere in his body. He merely stared wide-eyed as he steadied his breathing, afraid that if he failed to restrain his heart, blood would spurt from the wound.

An ordinary person would have died from such a devastating injury to the heart long ago. But once one had mastered Tendons, Bones, and Skin, completed the External Three Harmonies, and entered the Flesh Refining Realm, one could gain preliminary control over one's muscles.

Under such circumstances, as a master of the Flesh Refining Realm, he possessed extraordinarily tenacious vitality.

Even so, an injury to the heart remained extremely grave. If not for that Dragon Tiger Great Pill, Li Haomiao would have long since drawn his last breath.

He was already on the verge of death.

"You'd better stop provoking him. If his emotions fluctuate even a little, he might really die."

A somewhat aged voice suddenly sounded behind Xu Yunfan.

Xu Yunfan shuddered. He lowered his body, nearly flattening himself against the ground, and shot away at top speed. Only after darting more than ten meters away did he stop.

When he turned back, he saw an aged face with white hair and beard right in front of him.

Xu Yunfan's scalp exploded with numbness, his heart clenched fiercely, and a chill shot from his spine to the crown of his head.

His legs sprang apart as if released by springs, instantly settling into a firm horse stance. His knees drew slightly inward like the roots of an ancient tree, pinning him firmly to the ground. His waist twisted rapidly like a powerful coiled spring ready to unleash, driving the strength of his entire upper body upward through his spine.

The muscles on his back bulged high like two solid hills. Every muscle was taut to the limit, as though he were squeezing all the power in his body out at once.

Then his shoulders sank with the motion, his arm muscles tightening like iron. His biceps and triceps worked in tandem, driving his fist forward like a heavy hammer.

The punch howled through the air, carrying a fierce whistle of wind.

He was confident that even if there were a stone before him, this punch would smash it to pieces.

The next instant, his pupils contracted violently. A palm covered his fist, and all the force he had unleashed vanished like a mud ox sinking into the sea, without raising even the slightest ripple.

Then that hand coiled around his arm like a golden snake winding silk, pressing several points around his body.

Before Xu Yunfan could react, the aged face swiftly retreated, arriving beside Li Haomiao in the blink of an eye.

Xu Yunfan froze, then focused his gaze. An old Daoist in a long azure robe had appeared.

The old Daoist was exceptionally tall, well over two meters. His body was as gaunt as dead branches, and an indescribably eerie aura emanated from him. He truly resembled the legendary Slender Man, sending a chill through one's heart.

The old Daoist muttered incessantly in a low, hoarse voice. "His aptitude is too poor. The little true blood he had seems to have been completely exhausted through cultivating the Crimson Flame Copper Body Art and Cloak Hammer."

As he spoke, he slowly crouched down, his fingers moving like nimble ghosts as they rapidly tapped several points on Li Haomiao's body.

Miraculously, Li Haomiao's paper-white face swiftly turned rosy at that instant, as if vigorous life had been injected into him.

With an anguished expression, the old Daoist carefully took out a pill from his robes. Then, with a look of frustration at his failure, he smacked Li Haomiao twice and cursed irritably, "You prodigal brat, you're about to squander away all the Dao Sect's reserves."

Li Haomiao slowly opened his eyes. When he saw the old Daoist before him, a trace of guilt immediately appeared on his face. He stammered, "Master, I was wrong. Back then, I shouldn't have trusted others so easily and gone down the mountain without permission."

A master from the Dao Sect?!

Only then did the tension in Xu Yunfan's heart gradually ease.

Along the way, he had asked around about the Dao Sect quite a bit. He only knew that it was the foremost Daoist sect of the Great Zhou Empire, filled with masters and shrouded in mystery. Even after probing indirectly, he had failed to learn much useful information.

Only then did Fang Mushan finally manage to crawl out of the snow pit.

His face was flushed red, full of guilt. "Sorry, I didn't charge in and arrive first."

"It's fine. Your determination to join the fight was no less than mine. You were just unlucky."

Xu Yunfan comforted him. As the two spoke, Li Haomiao swallowed the pill and raised a hand to point at Xu Yunfan more than ten meters away, muttering something softly.

The old Daoist shook his head slightly and said only one sentence, but Xu Yunfan did not hear it clearly.

The instant the old Daoist finished speaking, Li Haomiao's eyes went wide and his voice rose sharply. "Master, you must have misjudged him. He mastered the Crimson Flame Copper Body Art and Cloak Hammer after one practice and understood it at a touch, yet you call him mediocre?!"

The old Daoist remained calm, his tone certain. "There is no trace of true blood in his body. This martial art has likely exhausted all of his true blood. And his aptitude is far too ordinary. Even the Dao Sect's introductory martial arts would probably take him decades of wasted effort."

After a pause, he added indifferently, "Though True Blood Practitioners are not common in this world, they are not few either. Being able to awaken that trace of true blood within one's body already counts as heaven-sent fortune. Bringing him to the Dao Sect would be meaningless as well, and would merely create more trouble."

Li Haomiao was stunned upon hearing this. Then he looked at Xu Yunfan with a face full of guilt. "I harmed him."

After a pause, he added, "I promised to give him a true art of the External Three Harmonies, Master..."

"A true art?"

The old Daoist's brows immediately furrowed. He cast Xu Yunfan an unhappy glance, his gaze filled with dissatisfaction.

Xu Yunfan raised his brows as well, an inexplicable discomfort rising in his heart. This old bastard...

Li Haomiao then said a few more words.

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