!----
The next day.
Early in the morning, while the sky was still only beginning to brighten, before the people of Cihang Jingzhai could come up with a way to rescue their captured Fairy Shi Feixuan, she was released first by Kou Zhong and his two fellow disciples from the manor considered the most terrifying place in all of Luoyang, one that no one dared approach or provoke.
No one knew what she had endured that night. In any case, the martial artists still gathered in Luoyang knew only that from then on, nobody ever saw her in the city again.
Likewise!
That foremost Daoist master of the Central Plains, the "Wanderer" Ning Daoqi, was never seen again either.
That old Daoist had certainly had rotten luck!
When the Pure Thought Monastery had invited him, he probably thought that dealing with and holding off "Fierce Bear" Annie, another Grandmaster, while buying time for Shi Feixuan and the others to seize the Heshi Bi would be no great challenge. After all, they were both top-tier martial artists at the Grandmaster level. Defeating each other might indeed be difficult, but keeping the fight at a stalemate should have been a piece of cake.
And yet...
Who could have guessed that "Fierce Bear" Annie would be so terrifying? With just one palm strike, she had sent him—the foremost Daoist master of the Central Plains, a renowned Grandmaster of many years—flying just as she had Yuwen Huaji, Du Fuwei of "Universe in the Sleeve," and Han Gaitian of the Sea Sand Gang?
At the time, many people had instinctively thought he was dead.
After all, plenty of people had seen it happen. The moment the old Daoist was blasted away, the clothes over his chest had been torn to shreds, blood had spurted from