From the Cold Palace Princess to the Heavenly Empress Chapter 14

"Cultivation techniques... Could this place be a stronghold of Beiyang City's evil cultivators?"

Xiao Minghuang pondered for a moment, then her expression froze.

Beiyang City lay at the border between the northern mountains and the Great Xia Plain, wedged amid towering peaks. Apart from scattered villages and towns along a single main road, everything else was desolate Savage Forest.

If three to five evil cultivators hid within the forest, even if one cast a net over heaven and earth, it would still be difficult to find the slightest trace of them.

But unfortunately for them,

Some opportunity was hidden upon these evil cultivators, or within this cave, and Xiao Minghuang had followed the compass's guidance all the way here.

"After wearing out iron shoes searching in vain, I found it without the slightest effort."

Xiao Minghuang sighed. She had come to wipe out the evil cultivators of Beiyang City, yet she had not expected to encounter them so quickly.

The next moment, she concealed her aura, lightened her steps, and silently made her way deeper into the cave.

After passing another bend, Xiao Minghuang spotted a faint glimmer of light.

As she drew closer, she saw a burly man leaning against the rock wall, giving off the aura of the Body Tempering Realm Seventh Level as he dozed.

Xiao Minghuang sniffed, and a foul stench of blood rushed into her nostrils.

"This smell isn't from an animal. Could it be human blood?"

Her gaze settled on the burly man. The bloody stench was emanating from him.

"Perfect. I'll ask you for a clear explanation."

Xiao Minghuang's figure flashed, and in the next instant, she appeared atop the table behind the burly man.

The burly man seemed to hear some movement. He shifted his body and muttered:

"Don't make trouble, little beauty. I'm tired today. I'll dote on you tomorrow."

Standing atop the table, Xiao Minghuang's eyes flashed with cold light. She raised an arm, and a faint golden gleam flickered at her fingertips.

After entering the Qi Refining Realm, she could already guide spiritual power out of her body. Even without touching an enemy, she could still take their life.

A faint golden glow enveloped her slender fingertip as it pressed against the back of the man's neck. It seemed to carry the weight of a thousand jun, leaving the huge man unable to move.

All of a sudden,

The burly man jolted awake. Before he could understand what had happened, he felt an overwhelmingly powerful force clamped against the spine at the back of his neck. With the slightest exertion, his head and body would be parted!

"I ask, you answer. Speak one false word, and you die on the spot!"

In the pitch-black cave, Xiao Minghuang's calm voice rang out, like the grim reaper at midnight, summoning souls and claiming lives.

"...Yes."

The burly man answered in a trembling voice.

"Who are you people? What are you doing here?"

"This lowly one and the others are cultivators from near Beiyang City. We hunt ferocious beasts in the mountains. Since we are too far from the city, we stay in this cave at night."

Xiao Minghuang said mildly:

"Oh? Is that so?"

The burly man felt the pressure at the back of his neck grow ever stronger. His heart nearly split with terror as he said shakily:

"...Y-yes! Heroine, please do not wrongly kill an innocent man!"

"Isn't that wrong? The civilians you abducted and brutally killed are the true innocents, aren't they?"

As she spoke, killing intent radiated in all directions.

That killing intent was incomparably dense, like a sharp sword that nearly pierced through the burly man's body.

Under such crushing pressure, the burly man trembled without end, nearly unable to stand. A stream of murky liquid trickled down his trouser leg.

At the same time,

Besides the foul stench of blood, Xiao Minghuang caught another pungent, reeking odor in the air.

Covering her nose, she said impatiently, "I'll give you one last chance. Tell me the truth quickly, or die!"

This time, the burly man no longer dared hide anything. He recounted everything from beginning to end.

After a round of interrogation, Xiao Minghuang roughly understood the situation within this cave.

Fiery Wedding Dress

There truly was a group of evil cultivators within the cave—the very evil cultivators causing trouble around Beiyang City.

This cave was one of their strongholds. Every time they plundered people, they came here to rest and regroup.

According to the burly man, their group had five members in total, known as the "Fifty Great Bandits."

Yet only four were in the cave. Their eldest brother had gone out on business and had yet to return.

"How many people have you robbed in total? Where are they being held?"

Xiao Minghuang asked one final question.

"We caught seven women and four children. They're all locked in the dungeon at the very deepest part of the cave."

"Where is the female cultivator at the Body Tempering Realm Seventh Level being held?"

Upon hearing this, the burly man's heart skipped a beat. This heroine even knew they had captured a female cultivator at the Body Tempering Realm Seventh Level. Could she be someone from that woman's family, who had come to rescue her after learning the news?

"That female cultivator is being held in Third Brother's... Ah, no! In the Three Demon Heads' room. That demon cultivates an evil technique and often steals women's primordial yin to cultivate. Afterward, he cruelly kills those women. Heroine, you must not spare that beast!"

The burly man declared indignantly, looking as though he shared a common hatred with her.

Xiao Minghuang smiled without smiling and asked, "You call others cultivators of evil techniques, yet you reek of blood. Don't you drink human blood to cultivate as well?"

"I don't! I'm not!"

The burly man hurriedly denied it. "It's all animal blood, not human blood!"

Xiao Minghuang did not answer. Whether it was or not, she had her own judgment.

After explaining everything, the burly man asked tremblingly:

"H-heroine, this lowly one has answered all your questions. Can you let this lowly one leave now?"

Expressionless, Xiao Minghuang withdrew the finger hovering against the back of his neck. The golden light went out, and darkness returned all around.

"Go."

Feeling the tremendous force at the back of his neck vanish, the burly man felt as though he had received a pardon. He immediately started to flee.

But after only two steps,

A point of golden light suddenly flashed within the pitch-black cave, like a shooting star tearing through the night sky, vanishing in an instant.

The starlight was incredibly fast. Before the burly man could react, it pierced through his chest and passed through his body, leaving behind a bloody hole as thick as a thumb.

The burly man's vision instantly went black, followed by a sharp pain in his chest. Scarlet blood gushed out like a spring, and in the next instant, his breath ceased as his corpse crashed to the ground.

After killing the burly man, Xiao Minghuang did not spare the corpse a second glance. Her expression unchanged, she remained graceful and composed. With a flash, she drifted down from the table and continued deeper into the cave.

As she went farther in, she discovered several more evil cultivators with even lower cultivation. Not one had surpassed the Body Tempering Realm Sixth Level.

These evil cultivators were so weak that they did not notice Xiao Minghuang's arrival at all. They were slain in their sleep.

Before long,

Xiao Minghuang reached the deepest part of the cave.

After clearing the way, more than ten evil cultivators had died by her hand. Other than the leading "Fifty Great Bandits," all had been put to death.

"Other than the eldest brother who isn't here, the remaining three should be inside this stone building."

Xiao Minghuang looked at the towering stone pavilion before her and steadied herself.

"To carve out such a massive structure within such a small cave—they truly went to great pains!"

Standing at the entrance, she could faintly hear the rowdy voices of evil cultivators inside. There were far more than just the three leaders.

More than twenty auras emanated from within the building, though most were not highly cultivated. Very few had surpassed the Body Tempering Realm Sixth Level.

Only three auras at the peak of the Body Tempering Realm were being emitted. They should be the three leading evil cultivators.

As for Qi Refining Realm martial artists, there were none at all.

"The evil cultivators' eldest brother should be absent. The rest inside are all lackeys. Taking them on one by one would be too troublesome. I might as well kill them all at once."

Ever since cultivating the Ziwei Imperial Dao Scripture, she had never fully activated the technique. This was the perfect chance to test the power of starlight.

Xiao Minghuang murmured softly. Then she stirred the spiritual power throughout her body. Whirlwind-like vortices appeared at her lower abdomen, chest, and hands, drawing in the free spiritual energy between heaven and earth.

A faint light flashed between her brows. A point of golden radiance emerged from her body, illuminating the entire dark cave and making it as bright as day in an instant.

The brilliant starlight was like a comet in the night sky, seemingly carrying the mighty force to pierce heaven and earth as it pressed down upon the stone building.

Inside the stone building.

"Come! Brothers! Keep drinking!"

The evil cultivators all had bleary eyes and spinning heads when they suddenly saw a flash of light outside the windows.

Before they could react in any way, that light descended before them.

The evil cultivators widened their eyes, their pupils filled with disbelief, as though they had witnessed the most dazzling and beautiful sight of their lives.

Yet beyond that boundless splendor lay cold, merciless death.

The starlight went out.

Xiao Minghuang's face paled slightly, and the four vortices on her body faded away. Feeling her Dantian completely empty, she took out a pill and placed it in her mouth. As her spiritual power steadily recovered, she could not help but smile bitterly.

"Although I've advanced to the fourth level of the Qi Refining Realm, releasing starlight once actually drains all the spiritual energy from my entire Dantian."

Xiao Minghuang took another pill from her storage pouch and placed it in her mouth, replenishing the spiritual energy she had squandered completely.

Even so, this was a tremendous improvement over before.

When she had first learned the Ziwei Imperial Dao Scripture, she had been completely unable to use this technique on her own.

She had needed to rely on external spirit stones to supply spiritual energy before she could use it.

But now it was different. She needed only rely on her own spiritual power to use the technique. Her progress was far from insignificant.

Moreover, Xiao Minghuang discovered that the Ziwei Imperial Dao Scripture and the Big Dipper Seven Stars Sword Technique seemed to come from the same source, with no barrier whatsoever between them.

"Could it be that the Big Dipper Seven Stars Sword Technique is part of the Ziwei Imperial Dao Scripture, only later separated from it?"

Xiao Minghuang murmured to herself. It was merely a conjecture, one she had no way to verify.

She stepped into the stone building, where corpses covering the ground immediately greeted her eyes.

"I acted too quickly. I should have asked where the people they captured were being held."

Xiao Minghuang's delicate brows furrowed slightly. Then she spread out her spiritual sense.

Not far beyond the stone building, her spiritual sense spotted a small house, where she suddenly sensed a restless aura.

"I remember that man saying they captured a woman at the Body Tempering Realm Seventh Level and held her separately in the Three Demon Heads' room."

Thinking of this, Xiao Minghuang immediately headed toward that room.

As she neared the house, she faintly heard the sound of porcelain falling and shattering inside.

A sense of foreboding arose in Xiao Minghuang's heart, and she quickened her pace.

Inside the room.

A woman dressed in a fiery red wedding gown sat within. Her figure was graceful, and through her thin red gauze veil, one could vaguely make out her beautiful face, delicate and lustrous as white jade.

At this moment, the woman was curled up in the farthest corner of the room. Ropes bound her entire body, leaving her unable to move. A towel had been stuffed into her mouth, preventing her from making the slightest sound. Red cloth covered her eyes, and her body trembled without cease, clearly frightened to the extreme.