Slaying a Living Spirit with One Finger

Yang Xiao was a little nervous. This was his first time refining a high-grade Spirit Artifact, and he only had one set of materials.

The scorching Earth Vein Flame melted the nine auxiliary materials into a pool of golden liquid.

Yang Xiao's palm trembled slightly. All he had to do now was add the Thousand-Spirit Poison Spider's venom sac, and the first step would be complete.

Watching the golden liquid gradually solidify, Yang Xiao made up his mind. If he did not toss it in now, this set of materials would be ruined.

His magical power lifted the venom sac and slowly moved it toward the Earth Vein Flame. The instant it entered the flame, the sac melted into a pool of black liquid. He controlled the black and golden liquids, merging them as the golden liquid slowly turned black.

A moment later, Yang Xiao let out a small breath of relief. The first step was complete.

Immediately afterward, his expression grew even more solemn. The first step was not particularly difficult. The key was the second—shaping.

With delicate control of his magical power, he slowly stretched the black liquid within the Earth Vein Flame, gradually forming the rough shape of a five-meter-long Black Rope.

Yang Xiao slowly lowered the temperature of the Earth Vein Flame, and the liquid began to solidify. Once the flame had completely turned into Earth Vein Qi, he formed a hand seal and sent it flying into the qi. The liquid solidified completely, and a Black Rope flew out.

The warmth in his hand filled his heart with excitement. He was halfway to success.

As only the second person in history to be both a Heavenly Master and an Earth Master, how could he refine a Spirit Artifact without baptizing it in heavenly lightning?

He flew outside and stood in midair, opening the Thundercloud Fan. Nine Nine Thunder Formations gathered in nine directions. He tossed the Thousand-Spirit Spider Rope into the air, and nine bolts of lightning instantly struck it. After the lightning passed, the rope's power rose by a considerable margin. Only after repeating this nine times did Yang Xiao summon it back.

Sensing the mighty power within it, Yang Xiao's confidence rose as well.

He deployed it with a wave of his hand. The Thousand-Spirit Spider Rope flew into the mountains, and dozens of Sea Condensation Realm demonic beasts dissolved into pools of black water after merely being brushed by it.

Suddenly, a powerful aura rose into the distant sky and headed straight toward him.

The first to arrive was a black Flying Crane, which circled above his head without leaving.

Yang Xiao frowned. He sensed some kind of connection between himself and the Flying Crane, as though it were him.

The Black Rope wound around it, turning the Flying Crane into a pile of black ash that fell into Yang Xiao's hand.

Looking toward the horizon again, he saw a streak of light fly over and stop in midair. The newcomer was an old man with white hair, brows, and beard, dressed in luxurious blue robes.

He immediately understood. The Flying Crane was a special means of tracking someone, and this man had used it to find him.

The old man looked very elderly, but the pressure radiating from him told Yang Xiao that he was a Living Spirit Realm cultivator.

"Yang Xiao, you brat! Today, I will grind your bones to dust and scatter your ashes!" A fire of vengeance rose in Huangfu Qi's icy eyes.

"Are you the master of the Heavenly Master Palace?" Yang Xiao asked, then realized that seemed unlikely. The Heavenly Masters of the Heavenly Master Palace all liked wearing white robes, while this man wore blue.

"I am Huangfu Qi! Huangfu Shenghua and Huangfu Shengtian were my grandsons!" Huangfu Qi roared and brought out a spirit saber.

At the sight of it, Yang Xiao turned and ran. Having just refined a high-grade Spirit Artifact, he had thought he could roam the Ten Thousand Peaks Forest unchallenged. Who could have known that Huangfu Qi would produce a supreme-grade Spirit Artifact in the blink of an eye?

Yang Xiao did not dare fight him. He was nowhere near Huangfu Qi's match, and a supreme-grade Spirit Artifact widened the gulf between them. Even if he brought out the Dragon Horn, he might not be able to defeat him.

After using the Dragon Horn, he would lose the ability to fight. If Huangfu Qi survived, Yang Xiao would be the one to die.

With his feet on the ground, he controlled the Earth Chain to obstruct Huangfu Qi. But Huangfu Qi was far stronger than he had imagined. Holding his spirit saber, he cleaved the Earth Chain apart in a single stroke without slowing in the slightest.

Seeing Huangfu Qi draw closer behind him, with saber light bearing down on his back, Yang Xiao could only find another way to escape. Relying on his own strength alone, he would certainly die within three minutes.

A streak of saber light swept past him, leaving a wound on his arm deep enough to expose bone. Without dissipating, it cleaved through dozens of large trees and several massive boulders ahead before striking the ground and carving out a huge fissure.

Yang Xiao was scared nearly out of his soul. A Living Spirit Realm cultivator at full strength was terrifying indeed. He sensed the nearest Soul Seed Realm demonic beast and ran toward it.

"Hello." Yang Xiao greeted a Sea Condensation Realm Redfire Bull as he passed. The bull scraped its hooves against the ground and snorted two jets of flame, ready to gore him.

Just then, a flash of white light swept past, severing its horn in two. The Redfire Bull shuddered, turned, and fled.

"You beast, bullying the weak and fearing the strong!" Yang Xiao cursed, picking up his pace even more.

He sprinted all the way, his black robe already slashed open in several places, blood running down his body and dripping onto the ground.

The curses behind him kept him from stopping for even an instant. Stopping meant death.

At last, Yang Xiao spotted the mountain's only Soul Seed Realm demonic beast: a black dog the size of an adult human, with a horn on its head.

The two met, their eyes locking. The black dog opened its mouth slightly, baring its fangs, about to bite into the meal that had delivered itself to its door.

Yang Xiao veered aside, revealing Huangfu Qi charging up behind him with his saber. At the sight, the black dog whimpered, turned, and took off on all fours.

"Brother, wait for me!" Yang Xiao chased after it. He had never expected even a Soul Seed Realm demonic beast to fear death so much that it would not dare exchange a single blow with Huangfu Qi.

But how could Yang Xiao let it go? Even if he died, he would drag someone down with him.

A dog and a man sprinted headlong, while behind them, an old man holding a saber roared from time to time and slashed.

Whenever that happened, the man and dog leaped off the ground and ran even faster.

Woof, woof, woof!

The black dog demonic beast turned its head and barked a few times, sending three wind blades flying toward Yang Xiao.

He sidestepped them. Hearing the explosion behind him, he inwardly gave the black dog a thumbs-up. Although it had aimed at him, he had turned its force to his advantage and delayed Huangfu Qi for a second.

Although the black dog did not dare fight Huangfu Qi head-on, its attacks were still powerful. At the very least, Huangfu Qi had to act to block its wind blades.

"Lord Dog, do you have any brothers? Hurry and call them over! We can fight him together!" Yang Xiao ran flat out. The black dog's wind blades were powerful, but after it launched them twice, Huangfu Qi recognized the pattern and began dodging. The distance between them shrank again.

Woof, woof, woof!

The black dog barked furiously. Yang Xiao could not understand what it was saying, but he guessed it was cursing him.

That did nothing to shake his resolve to drag the dog into this mess, especially after seeing that it could hold up Huangfu Qi's pursuit.

Suddenly, Yang Xiao turned and ran in another direction. He had sensed another demonic beast's aura, seemingly that of a Living Spirit Realm beast.

The black dog stood on all fours, drooling as it gazed in the direction Yang Xiao had fled.

That had truly scared the dog out of its wits.

Fortunately, they were close to the depths of the Ten Thousand Peaks Forest, where Soul Seed Realm demonic beasts were common.

Yang Xiao reached the source of the aura and abruptly stopped.

There was a pool here, surrounded by many exotic flowers and plants.

Ripples spread across the water. In the middle of the pool, he saw a fair-skinned back.

A beauty emerging from her bath!

No, that's wrong. I only saw her back. That doesn't count.

Yang Xiao swallowed. He had actually stumbled upon such a tantalizing scene.

Then cold sweat broke out across Yang Xiao's back. Coming to his senses, he instantly threw himself aside. Saber light skimmed past his back, cutting a deep gash across it.

"Run!" Yang Xiao shouted to the woman in the pool.

Huangfu Qi had caught up, yet Yang Xiao still had not seen the demonic beast he had sensed. He was doomed today.

The water trembled, and the pool rose in a cloud of mist. A massive dark silhouette moved within it.

Yang Xiao swallowed again. So the demonic beast had been hiding at the bottom of the pool. No, wait—did that not mean the woman in the middle was in danger?

Yang Xiao, oh, Yang Xiao, what on earth are you thinking? You're about to die, and you're still worrying about whether someone else lives or dies.

He turned and saw Huangfu Qi approaching with his saber, his face filled with killing intent. His chilling gaze sent the surrounding temperature plummeting. With every step, the flowers and plants within ten meters of him froze.

However, Huangfu Qi stopped ten meters away and looked toward the pool, his expression somewhat grave.

Yang Xiao followed Huangfu Qi's gaze, but kept his attention on Huangfu Qi.

He gripped the Dragon Horn behind his back. If Huangfu Qi came even one meter closer, he would unleash it and perish together with him.

The mist dispersed, and the first thing he saw was a gigantic white python.

It was a Living Spirit Realm demonic beast. Yang Xiao felt pressure from the white python no weaker than Huangfu Qi's.

A woman in white stood atop the python's head, her face covered by a veil. Although he could not see her entire face, what little she revealed convinced him that she was an incomparable beauty in no way inferior to Dongfang Mingyue.

Barefoot and starry-eyed, the woman in white stood upon the python without looking the slightest bit out of place, as though she had been born to stand there.

"A D-Demon Immortal." Huangfu Qi's voice trembled slightly, as though he had seen some terrifying being.

Did "Demon Immortal" refer to the white python or the woman? Yang Xiao could sense no trace of magical power in the woman in white, as though she were an ordinary mortal. But how could a mortal stand atop a Living Spirit Realm white python's head?

"Trespassers in the depths of the Ten Thousand Peaks Forest die." The woman in white had a lovely voice. Her speech sounded like singing, even though her words were heavy with killing intent.

The white python roared, flew out of the pool, and charged at Huangfu Qi. He slashed out a streak of white light, then turned and fled, abandoning even Yang Xiao, the murderer of his grandsons, as though he had encountered something utterly terrifying.

"A mere Living Spirit, and you think you can escape?" The woman in white spoke again and pointed a finger. Far away, Huangfu Qi, who had been sprinting headlong, suddenly stopped and collapsed face-first onto the ground.

Yang Xiao stiffly turned his head. What had he just seen? This woman, who looked too weak to truss a chicken, had actually slain Huangfu Qi with a single strike.

Right, Huangfu Qi called her a Demon Immortal. Could she be a demonic beast that attained immortality and can now take human form?

"Demonic beast—pah! Hello, fairy sister!" Yang Xiao called out to her from a distance. Sweat poured from his back onto the ground, because the white python was slithering toward him.

Only a hundredth of a meter separated Yang Xiao from the white python's head. On his cold face, he could distinctly feel the warmth of the python's breath.

Looking up past its head, he saw the woman in white looking down at him, her brows slightly furrowed, as though she were wrestling with something.

Yang Xiao saw a chance. If she had not killed him, there was room to talk.

"Where did you get the Dragon Horn?" the woman in white asked softly, pointing at his hand behind his back. She showed none of the killing intent she had directed at Huangfu Qi.

Yet that single sentence made Yang Xiao's entire body stiffen. He had thought he could stake everything on the Dragon Horn, only for the woman in white to expose his trump card with a few words.

"The Severed Dragon Valley." Faced with a being powerful enough to inspire such despair, Yang Xiao had no intention of resisting.

"The Severed Dragon Valley. That makes sense. Only there could one obtain a Dragon Horn of such pure bloodline."

"Give me the Dragon Horn, and I will spare your life." The woman in white first murmured to herself, then turned her eyes toward him.

"Well..." Yang Xiao hesitated. He had brought the Dragon Horn out of the Severed Dragon Valley, and it had stayed with him ever since, helping him through many crises. He regarded it as his trump-card treasure. How could he willingly hand it over just like that?

"Whitey, kill him." The woman in white spoke again, her words now brimming with killing intent.

"I'll give it to you! I'll give it to you!" Yang Xiao tossed the Dragon Horn over. No matter how fine a treasure was, he needed to be alive to enjoy it. He had thought he had encountered a beauty who could topple cities, but she turned out to be a female star of slaughter.

Taking the Dragon Horn, the woman in white pondered for a moment, then tossed out a streak of white light.

"I will not take it for nothing. If you need anything, you may come here. You have only one chance."

Yang Xiao caught it and opened his hands. It was a white scale shimmering with a strange luster, clearly no ordinary object.

After speaking, the woman in white rode away on the white python, descending into a valley filled with the fragrance of flowers and the abundance of spring.

The white python growled softly at the woman in white, seemingly asking her something.

The woman in white walked toward a wooden house in the valley, its eaves covered in flowers, and replied:

"The Severed Dragon Valley is not a place just anyone can enter, nor is it a place just anyone can leave."