Destroying the Formation

The top floor of the White Tower.

Pang Jian, holding his spear, narrowed his eyes. Immersing himself in the surging spiritual power, his gaze grew as sharp and piercing as the spearhead.

"Whoosh! Whoosh, whoosh!"

Lightning-fast spiritual power erupted from his palm in the blink of an eye, the sheer speed and intensity making his heart race.

Before he could even react, a brilliant radiance suddenly flared, causing the dim chamber to shine with sudden luster!

Looking down, he saw that on the shaft of the spear, patterns resembling dragon markings were lighting up one by one!

As the spear glowed, Pang Jian clearly felt the cyan spiritual power he poured into the shaft being amplified in both force and sharpness by the dragon-patterned array.

Force meant that when he swung the spear, his power would surge exponentially.

Sharpness meant the tip of the Dragon-Patterned Spear would become peerlessly keen.

"Clang!"

A beam of cyan light shot out from the tip of the Dragon-Patterned Spear, striking a stone on the soul array with a sharp ring.

Pang Jian focused his eyes and saw a very shallow, tiny hole on the stone.

The hole, no larger than a pinky finger, looked like a small indentation, even though the tip of the Dragon-Patterned Spear hadn't actually pierced the stone itself.

Pang Jian felt greatly encouraged!

Previously, he had used the brute force of his arm bones combined with the Dragon-Patterned Spear, yet he could never leave even a single mark on those stones, nor could he shake them to shift their position.

Now, having opened only four meridians, the augmentation from the spiritual array within the Dragon-Patterned Spear allowed him to leave a mark on the stone immediately.

This meant he could use this to break the array!

The next moment, Pang Jian used his feet to drive his waist and hips, twisting his body to swing the Dragon-Patterned Spear, coordinating the thrust with the infusion of spiritual power!

The spear suddenly straightened, and a dazzling light erupted from the tip, as if a miniature sun had suddenly appeared in the dark chamber!

Pang Jian's vision blurred, and he followed the momentum to thrust the spear toward the skull-shaped soul array.

The spiritual power within his body responded to his movements, pouring mightily into the Dragon-Patterned Spear. Augmented by the "sharpness" and "force" of the dragon-patterned arrays, the radiance blooming from the spearhead became increasingly blinding!

Zhou Qingchen and the others outside the White Tower were all shocked by the sudden light emerging from the fifth floor and couldn't help but look over.

"Pfft!"

A stone containing "Profound Yin Power" was pierced through by Pang Jian's strike, the spearhead sinking deep into the interior of the hollow skull.

The spirit turtle, surrounded by countless mosquito-like soul wraiths and having its intelligence constantly eroded, suddenly sensed the appearance of the spearhead.

It opened its eyes once more, struggled to turn its direction, and looked gloomily at the spearhead thrust into the skull.

Having succeeded with one strike, Pang Jian grinned and suddenly exerted force, yanking the Dragon-Patterned Spear out!

As the Dragon-Patterned Spear was withdrawn, the eerie skull constructed from numerous strange stones suddenly began to collapse and disintegrate.

The once-integrated soul array, damaged in one spot, unexpectedly triggered the collapse of the whole.

"Crack, crack, crack!"

This mysterious soul array, like a pavilion hit by an earthquake, saw stone after stone shatter and fall to the ground.

Only then did the spirit turtle inside the skull dare to believe that the soul array imprisoning it had been destroyed.

The spirit turtle let out a silent cry, and the moment it broke free, it surged toward the sky, ignoring the existence of the tower top and passing directly through it to hover above the Lonely Island.

"Whoosh! Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!"

The soul wraiths that had surrounded it flew out from within the skull one after another, escaping through the four windows of the fifth floor.

Pang Jian was stunned.

He saw the mosquito-like soul wraiths suddenly magnify a hundredfold once they left the collapsing skull, turning into blurred soul shadows.

Some of the soul shadows were clearly human, some resembled the most powerful beasts of the Cenji Mountains, and others were neither human nor beast—strange creatures he had never seen before.

"That spirit turtle..."

He came to his senses, suddenly jumped out from an open window, and after landing with a thud, he looked up at the sky.

Under the gloomy, dim firmament, nearly a hundred soul wraiths were howling as they tried to escape this Lonely Island in the middle of the lake.

At the highest point, a deep green giant turtle covering over ten acres hovered steadily in mid-air. It was looking down at the Lonely Island below with a gaze full of sorrow and nostalgia.

It was filled with reluctance, seemingly unwilling to leave this territory that belonged to it, unwilling to embark on a new journey just like that.

"Pang Jian succeeded!"

"He destroyed the soul array above the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda, and all the imprisoned soul wraiths have been released by him!"

"One of the most terrifying functions of the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda has been neutralized!"

Han Duping, Su Meng, and even He Rong were screaming in excitement at this moment. They all looked up, watching the soul wraiths that had broken free from the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda.

At this very moment.

Figures with distinct, clear forms—the "Spirit Sha"—suddenly drifted out from the edges of Lake Heart Island, beginning to hunt down the weaker souls and ghosts.

Among these "Spirit Sha," two were people Zhou Qingchen and Han Duping recognized: Hong Tai and Luo Meng!

"That Demoness is on the island too! Hong Tai was killed by her!"

Han Duping was gripped by extreme terror.

The fact that even Hong Tai of the Dark Ghosts had died and been refined into a "Spirit Sha" meant that the Demoness they had encountered at the stone pile had recovered a great deal of her strength.

"Luo... Luo Meng..."

Shangguan Qin, whose range of movement was restricted to guarding that pit well, was also startled by the commotion on the low hill. She, too, saw the clearly defined figure of Luo Meng.

"It wasn't a hallucination. It really was Luo Meng that night! He appeared; he came to see me. Even after death, he came to see me!"

Shangguan Qin could no longer restrain herself. In this moment, she forgot that she was supposed to remain silent, weeping bitterly in a crazed, desolate state.

She struggled to stand on her tiptoes, waving frantically at Luo Meng—who had become a "Spirit Sha" and no longer recognized her—hoping he would come to find her just as he had before.

High above.

The giant spirit turtle, a beast soul, had been gazing longingly at the lonely island, reminiscing about days gone by.

But when the "Spirit Sha," like Hong Tai and Luo Meng, suddenly darted out from around the island, the spirit turtle dared not dwell on the past any longer and hurriedly flew toward the north of the mountains.

"Boom!"

The spirit turtle, in its soul form, seemed to collide with an invisible firmament, causing the space above the lonely island to tremble violently.

The spirit turtle hesitated for a moment, then rapidly contracted into a beam of green, ghostly light, once again heading toward the Extreme North of the Cenji Mountains.

"Swish!"

As if piercing through a barrier of light, the spirit turtle in its ghostly form broke through the seal and escaped.

The various souls and ghosts that had previously surrounded it lacked the ability to break the seal; under the pursuit of the "Spirit Sha," they were devoured and absorbed one by one.

"The firmament truly does contain a seal, and it is a seal meant for... a Black Tortoise."

Standing atop the low hill, Luo Hongyan, who could see Shangguan Qin and the pit well, watched the spirit turtle's soul depart without daring to command her "Spirit Sha" to pursue it.

The Black Tortoise was a rare spirit beast that haunted the Upper Realms, even more powerful than the "Dark Giant Python" of the Blackwater Pool.

Although the Black Tortoise was now only in soul form, it was still far stronger than the "Spirit Sha" she had refined. Had the Black Tortoise not been wary, even "Spirit Sha" like Hong Tai and Luo Meng would have become its prey.

"The three forbidden zones of the Cenji Mountains—the Blackwater Pool, the Insect Valley, and Lake Heart Island—all harbor miraculous, strange entities. The Dark Giant Python of the Blackwater Pool, the giant beehive of the Insect Valley, and now this Black Tortoise."

"The person behind this... can descend to the fifth layer of Eternal Darkness to capture a Dark Giant Python, and ascend to the second or even the first layer to snatch a Black Tortoise and keep it here!"

"Such a person..."

Watching the Black Tortoise disappear, Luo Hongyan furrowed her brows deeply and could not help but look toward the massive pit well.

"If the person inside that well is the creator of these three forbidden zones, then everyone on this island..."

Her lips were filled with bitterness.

Suddenly.

Because the soul formation within the White Tower had been destroyed and the various souls and ghosts were fleeing one after another, the entity submerged within that pit well seemed to have finally been disturbed.

"Ah!"

Shangguan Qin was the first to let out a cry of terror.

Her scream instantly brought everyone gazing at the sky back to their senses. Their hope that Pang Jian would break the soul formation had been rooted in their fear of the figure within the pit well.

They feared that once that person emerged, they would be able to regain control of the "Heavenly Spirit Pagoda" and use the soul formation to absorb the living souls of everyone present.

Shangguan Qin's terrified shriek surely meant she had sensed movement from beneath the pit well. That person... was finally coming out!

The group immediately crowded toward the top of the low hill, all wanting to face the pit well directly and see exactly who was emerging.

At this moment, having broken the array and witnessed the "Spirit Sha" hunting the souls and ghosts, Pang Jian also knew the Demoness from the stone pile was on the island.

When the spirit turtle fled toward the "Ghost Mist" in the Extreme North of the Cenji Mountains, he heard Shangguan Qin's scream and quickly moved toward them as well.

"Pang Jian, congratulations! You really have a knack for this, kid!"

Seeing him approach, Zhou Qingchen shoved Han Duping aside to make room for him.

Ignoring Han Duping's dissatisfaction, Zhou Qingchen said with a brilliant smile, "To open up a meridian upon first entering the Pulse-Opening Realm and to shatter the soul formation with the Dragon-Patterned Spear—I truly didn't misjudge you!"

Pang Jian did not mention that he had opened four arm meridians at once, saying only, "The Dragon-Patterned Spear you gifted me is very useful."

"The Dragon-Patterned Spear is only a basic spirit weapon. However, spirit weapons are fundamentally different from the long blades you used before, because spirit weapons can carry spiritual power and allow it to circulate within them—something ordinary weapons can never do."

Zhou Qingchen continued with a smile, "I gave you the Dragon-Patterned Spear back then because I knew you would definitely be able to enter the Pulse-Opening Realm! I just didn't expect you to do it so quickly!"

As he chatted and laughed with Pang Jian, he kept glancing at Shangguan Qin and staring at the pit well beside her.

The others were doing the same.

"Come here to me."

At the highest point of the hill, keeping her distance from the others and appearing entirely out of place, Luo Hongyan waved for Pang Jian to approach.

Zhou Qingchen was speechless, then smiled and winked, "I heard that after you and I parted ways, this girl's opinion of you changed quite a bit."

"Mm, she has indeed changed a lot."

Pang Jian walked toward Luo Hongyan.

"He's out!"

He Rong suddenly whispered sharply.

A series of probing gazes were all fixed intently on the massive pit created by the piercing of the Phoenix Bone.

Immediately, they saw a naked man, coated in viscous blood, crawling out of the pit at a leisurely pace.

His face, his hair, his body—every part of him was covered in sticky, congealed blood, making it impossible for everyone to discern his true features.

Shangguan Qin looked at him as if staring at the most terrifying demon in the world, trembling uncontrollably in fear.

He pursed his lips into a smile at Shangguan Qin, and as she felt her skin crawl, he tilted his head to glance at the low hill, looking at Pang Jian and the others standing in a row.

In the end, he said nothing at all, jumping straight into the nearby Wulan Lake to wash away the viscous bloodstains on his body of his own accord.