A Fellow Daoist Dies, Not This Poor Monk. Farewell, Junior Brother!

Blood light flashed, and the surrounding scenery hurtled backward madly, turning into blurred blocks of color.

Zhao Hao felt as if he had been thrown into a tumbling drum. The scenery around him twisted and stretched wildly, until finally, with a bang, he fell from midair and smashed hard into a carpet of dead leaves.

When his vision cleared again, he had already appeared in an unfamiliar mountain forest dozens of li away.

He wanted to climb to his feet, but his body was as soft as a puddle of rotten mud.

"Pfft—"

A mouthful of rebellious blood sprayed out. His face was as white as paper, and he gulped down ragged breaths as his heart hammered madly in his chest, as if it were about to explode.

An emptiness and icy cold that came from the depths of his soul instantly swept through his entire body.

What the Blood Escape Art had drained was a cultivator's blood essence!

The sword wound on his left shoulder sent out wave after wave of tearing agony. His entire arm had lost all feeling and hung limply at his side.

He lay paralyzed on the ground. Even breathing tugged at the wound, hurting so badly that blue veins bulged on his forehead.

He could not stop!

The distress jade talisman that female cultivator had crushed was a life-demanding talisman hanging over his head!

Zhao Hao gritted his teeth, braced himself against the ground with his only usable right hand, and struggled to climb up, leaning against a large tree.

At the first possible moment, he pushed the Qi Gazing Art and the Mysterious Yin Breath Concealment Art to their limits, locking every trace of his aura tightly inside his body.

Safe.

There was no aura of any cultivator in the surroundings.

Under the enhanced vision of the Qi Gazing Art, the outline of a small city appeared on the horizon over a dozen li away.

It was densely populated, with mixed and chaotic auras. That was the only place he could hide now.

He simply tore off the hem of his robe, hastily bandaged the wound that would not stop bleeding, and without the slightest hesitation, stole toward the small city.

As he staggered toward the small city in stealth, his mind was a complete mess.

That Golden Core elder's granddaughter whom Wu De had refined into a living corpse, and the junior sister whose heart he had just pierced through with one strike of the Evil Light Art...

Wonderful. An entire nest of someone's granddaughters had been ruined by the Extreme Yin Sect from top to bottom!

Whether he had done it or not, this account would ultimately be placed on the head of the Extreme Yin Sect—and on the head of him, the "murderer."

The expressionless, dried-corpse face of his master, True Person Corpse Heart, flashed through his mind.

He had exposed his cultivation at the ninth layer of Qi Refining. Once this news made it back to the sect...

How would True Person Corpse Heart "study" him, a "Heavenly Spiritual Root" who had shot from a mortal to the ninth layer of Qi Refining in three months?

And how would that old ghost Jia Ren deal with him, this "perfect vessel for possession"?

Death lay both ahead and behind!

Zhao Hao shuddered. A chill more bone-piercing than his injuries shot from the soles of his feet straight to the crown of his head.

No matter how strong one was in the Qi Refining Realm, before Foundation Establishment, one was still a grasshopper that could be pressed to death with a single finger.

He was now caught at the storm's eye between two great powers. His only path to survival was, before they could react, to use the chaos of this war and, at all costs...

Break through that threshold!

Foundation Establishment!

Only by reaching Foundation Establishment, then fleeing the troublesome land of the Northern Lands, would he have a way to live!

Having made up his mind, Zhao Hao circled around to a secluded corner of the small city wall. After confirming there was no one around, spiritual light flashed across his body, and his entire person sank silently into the ground.

Earth Escape Art!

He traveled underground, carefully avoiding inhabited dwellings, and finally surfaced soundlessly inside a room in a dilapidated courtyard, without stirring even the slightest dust.

He did not dare make any unnecessary movement. He changed into a set of worn cloth clothes he had pulled from his storage bag, then lay directly on a wooden plank bed covered in dust and pulled a moldy old quilt over himself.

He pushed the Mysterious Yin Breath Concealment Art to its limit, gathered in all his mind and spirit, adjusted his breathing, and made himself look like a mortal youth sound asleep.

Night fell.

The small city sank into silence.

Just when Zhao Hao thought he could pass the night safely, a powerful, sharp will without the slightest concealment swept over the entire small city in an instant like an invisible tide!

Foundation Establishment Realm divine sense!

Zhao Hao's heart skipped a beat.

He immediately gathered in all his mind and spirit, even stopping his healing. His entire person lay on the wooden plank bed beneath a thin quilt covered in quite a bit of dust, and he adjusted his breathing until his aura became long, even, and steady.

At this moment, he was an ordinary mortal who had been startled awake, so frightened that he hid under the quilt trembling, not daring to move at all.

That divine sense was filled with impatience and killing intent. It went back and forth through the city, sweeping it carefully three times.

Every time it swept over the room Zhao Hao was in, he felt as though his clothes had been stripped off and he had been thrown into a world of ice and snow.

Just as he thought the other party was about to give up—

Bzz—!

From the center of the city, a clear, fierce sword cry suddenly rang out!

The sound pierced metal and split stone; even from several li away, it still made people's eardrums ache from the shock!

Zhao Hao lay on the bed "shivering," but he could imagine that the mortals in the city must have been thrown into complete chaos at that moment.

He did not release his spiritual sense to investigate out of curiosity like the other cultivators.

He merely went along with how an ordinary person would react. His body gave a "terrified" jerk, his breathing grew a little more rapid, and then he forcibly suppressed it again, as if he were an ordinary commoner scared out of his wits yet not daring to make the slightest sound.

Sure enough.

After the sword cry, that Foundation Establishment Realm divine sense swept over once more!

This time, it swept faster and more roughly, focusing on areas where abnormal reactions had appeared after people were startled awake.

When it swept over Zhao Hao, it passed straight by without the slightest pause.

A mortal frightened half to death was not worth paying attention to.

That divine sense circled once more, and only after confirming there was nothing abnormal did it withdraw like the tide.

Until the horizon turned the pale white of a fish's belly, that suffocating pressure never appeared again.

Zhao Hao still did not dare move.

He did not dare use his spiritual sense. He only pricked up his ears and relied on his five senses, far sharper than a mortal's, to listen to the movements in the city.

After daybreak, voices gradually appeared on the streets.

He heard the neighbors lowering their voices to discuss it.

"Did you hear? Something happened at the Immortal Master Mansion last night!"

"More than something! When I got up in the middle of the night, I saw a streak of sword light cleave down from the sky with my own eyes. The Immortal Master Mansion... was just gone! Razed flat!"

"My heavens! Then... then the immortal masters living inside?"

"What else could have happened? I heard from the city guards that they couldn't even find a single intact bone... Tsk, tsk, too miserable..."

"Shh! Keep your voice down! You dare gossip about immortal masters? Do you have a death wish!!!"

The Immortal Master Mansion... was gone?

Zhao Hao lay on the bed, his eyes slowly opening, clear and lucid.

This region had originally been Extreme Yin Sect territory. The so-called Immortal Master Mansion in the small city had undoubtedly housed disciples sent by the Extreme Yin Sect to keep watch.

That sword cry last night...

It seemed the Foundation Establishment cultivator from the Heavenly Sword Sect, after finding nothing in his search, had taken his anger out on the local Extreme Yin Sect disciples and directly slaughtered them.

They had suffered disaster in his place.

There was no expression on Zhao Hao's face, yet for some reason, his heart relaxed.

Better a fellow Daoist die than this poor Daoist. Junior Brother, safe travels.