The Great Yin Sha Technique

Lei Dong not only failed to answer him, but kept staring at the doorway. He smiled faintly. "Senior Sister Ding, please stop teasing us junior brothers."

As soon as he finished speaking, the empty doorway shimmered, the air rippling faintly as wisps of Black Mist drifted past. Ding Wanyan's increasingly tall and lovely figure appeared before them out of thin air. Her female disciple's robes, black with red trim, and her cloak, fluttering constantly in the Sha Wind, lent her less of a gentle, ethereal air, but gave her a far more valiant and coolly beautiful bearing. Her clear, luminous eyes fixed on Lei Dong, and she asked in surprise, "Junior Brother Lei, your cultivation is clearly far beneath mine. How did you see through my Yin Sha Escape?"

Yin Sha Escape was a special kind of movement technique. Under ordinary circumstances, it was nothing remarkable, but when the surrounding environment was thick with Yin Sha Qi, using it was like a fish taking to water. The technique allowed its user to conceal their movements within the Killing Intent, drifting unpredictably like a ghost. With sufficient mastery, one could even achieve something akin to invisibility in places where Yin Sha Qi ran deep.

It was a movement technique that could be extraordinarily effective in the right environment. Its drawback, however, was that Yin Sha Qi did not gather just anywhere. Still, if the Yin Sha Sect had been able to develop this technique so extensively, it naturally had its reasons. A sect that had made its name largely through Yin Sha Qi had, of course, learned to wield it with consummate skill. The Great Yin Sha Technique was one of the Yin Sha Sect's most powerful arts. Once cultivated to a high level, it could summon Yin Sha Qi that blotted out the sky and covered the earth. It was said that when a Golden Core Ancestor used it, they could turn dozens of miles in every direction into a battlefield flooded with Yin Sha Qi.

The Yin Sha Sect had many arts that became extraordinarily powerful in places steeped in Yin Sha Qi. Yin Sha Escape was one of them. By choosing to cultivate it, Ding Wanyan had made it clear that she intended to follow the path of the Great Yin Sha Technique.

But the Great Yin Sha Technique was no ordinary art. It demanded exceptionally high aptitude, and more importantly, it was immensely difficult to cultivate and carried a risk of death. Otherwise, wouldn't everyone be able to learn such a powerful technique? Lei Dong would never even dream of cultivating the Great Yin Sha Technique, setting aside the danger involved. The extra time and effort it demanded were already beyond what he could afford. Perhaps only someone with Ding Wanyan's peerless aptitude had a chance of succeeding. And even then, it was only a chance. Otherwise, the Great Yin Sha Technique would not have become one of the Cultivation World's most renowned and feared arts. The Great Yin Sha Technique may well have been responsible for half the Yin Sha Sect's fame and its place among the Eight Great Sects.

"Senior Sister Ding, you truly are astonishingly bold, to dare cultivate the Great Yin Sha Technique." Having pieced together what had happened, Lei Dong smiled wryly. "The reason I saw through your Yin Sha Escape is, first, that I mainly cultivate the Ghost Taming Art, so naturally I also cultivate the Spirit Forging Art. After years of diligent practice, I've made some progress in it. My Mind Power and spiritual sense are fairly strong, so I can see through various movement techniques more easily. Second, you may not have been cultivating Yin Sha Escape for very long, and perhaps you're not yet familiar with it. When you shifted positions just now, you left a few flaws; your movements didn't quite match the flow of the Yin Sha Qi."

Ding Wanyan looked at Lei Dong with a hint of admiration and praised him. "I don't even know yet whether I can master it. But Junior Brother Lei truly is remarkable. I did feel that something wasn't flowing quite smoothly in one spot, but I didn't think much of it. I've made a fool of myself in front of you."

Ever since Lei Dong became a Personal Disciple, he and Ding Wanyan had interacted far more often. They regularly saw each other when the Ancestor lectured, and Lei Dong had deliberately cultivated their friendship in private. Though they didn't meet especially often, their relationship had gradually grown stronger and warmer with time. They were a far cry from the strangers they had once been.

The two of them listened as Lei Dong and Ding Wanyan exchanged compliments. They secretly found it amusing, but kept their faces solemn. They dared to act familiar with Lei Dong, but in front of Ding Wanyan, the big sister of their group, they hardly dared breathe too loudly. Especially since she had surely heard them gossiping about her behind her back. If they didn't keep a low profile now, wouldn't they be walking straight into the line of fire?

"You two go back first. Junior Brother Lei and I have something important to discuss." Ding Wanyan had barely said a few words before she began sending them away.

Chen Ge and Wei Hua didn't dare object. They hurriedly bowed and took their leave. But when they reached the doorway, Chen Ge gave Lei Dong a hard wink, then jerked his chin toward Ding Wanyan. Even if Lei Dong had thought about it with his backside, he knew Chen Ge wasn't suggesting anything decent.

Then Ding Wanyan seemed about to turn around, and Chen Ge hurriedly put on a solemn expression before he and Wei Hua swiftly left.

Only after they were gone did Ding Wanyan let out a deep breath. For some reason, her face felt a little hot. She had indeed come to see Lei Dong, but she hadn't expected Chen Ge and Wei Hua to be there too. She had hesitated, wanting to slip away quietly, but Chen Ge's irritating remarks had unsettled her Qi and left her with a flaw that Lei Dong had seen through and called out. So she had no choice but to steel herself, pretend to be composed, and send the two of them away.

Perhaps because she felt awkward, Ding Wanyan suddenly didn't know what to say. Lei Dong, meanwhile, assumed she was gathering her thoughts, so he stood silently, looking ready to listen.

Ding Wanyan's thoughts were in a jumble. Could Junior Brother Lei be imagining all sorts of things? Will he think I came to visit because I have feelings for him? Before she came, she hadn't thought there was anything odd about visiting Lei Dong. But things had turned out differently than she expected. By a twist of fate, they were now caught in an extremely ambiguous atmosphere. Neither of them spoke, making things even more awkward and strange.

Lei Dong was startled too. What does it mean that Senior Sister Ding looks so shy and delicate, with her cheeks flushed? Could she have feelings for me? Before now, he had never considered that possibility. He had always known his place: with Ding Wanyan's aptitude and beauty, she was far beyond his reach. Rather than invite humiliation, he had thought it better not to entertain such an unrealistic idea.

Of course, nothing was impossible. They were both young, and it was only natural that spending time together might give rise to unspoken feelings. But after a brief flutter of his heart, Lei Dong immediately cast the thought aside. Senior Sister Ding was an excellent match, but his own aptitude was only average, and reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm would be no easy task. If he let himself get distracted by romance and wasted the best years for cultivation, he might well spend his whole life stuck at the Qi Refining Stage, unable to advance.

Still, they couldn't go on sitting in awkward silence. The longer it lasted, the more they might make things worse by trying to explain them away. Lei Dong coughed twice and found a topic. "Senior Sister Ding, please don't take offense. Chen Ge has always been rather talkative, but he's a good-hearted person. I hope you won't take what he said to heart."

Hearing Lei Dong speak so clearly helped Ding Wanyan's mind clear a little. Her complexion settled somewhat, and she shook her head. "As the foremost Personal Disciple of this generation under the Ancestor, I can hardly avoid people talking about me behind my back. If I took offense at everything, wouldn't I only be making trouble for myself?"

"Senior Sister Ding is certainly magnanimous," Lei Dong said mildly.

Taking a deep breath, Ding Wanyan put aside her jumble of thoughts and remembered why she had come. She took a bottle of pills from her Storage Belt and held it out to him. "Junior Brother Lei, you don't cultivate baleful arts. Even if you constantly circulate your energy to resist it, staying in this Yin Sha Land for too long will inevitably let some Yin Sha Qi seep into your blood. Over time, it will harm your health. There are ten Sha-dispelling Pills in this bottle. Take one every month to purge the Killing Intent."

Lei Dong was taken aback. Why was Senior Sister Ding so concerned about him? Could she really have feelings for him?