Chapter 35

Yu Yin could clearly feel her life ebbing away, but she was now too weak even to speak.

Through the haze, she saw a pair of small, spotless white Sect Boots appear before her.

Yu Yin struggled to lift her head and look at their owner, her mouth slowly stretching into a horrifying grin.

Yun Qiqi felt a chill of fright and tugged at Su Jiu, who stood in front of her, but failed to budge her.

"You're going to die." Su Jiu calmly stated what was about to happen.

Yu Yin's half-formed grin finally faded.

"Have you ever thought about what will happen to Yu Ying afterward?"

At last, Yu Yin felt a trace of fear. She did, after all, still care about Yu Ying.

"Frightened now? Then why couldn't you think of her while you were doing all this?"

A hint of pleading entered Yu Yin's eyes, as though she were begging them to spare Yu Ying.

Su Jiu looked at her calmly and said slowly, "I'm not you." She would not harm innocent fellow disciples.

Before long, the people from the Enforcement Hall arrived.

Su Jiu had not expected Xia Jue to come in person this time. Xia Jue was the sect leader's eldest disciple and the Enforcement Hall's chief enforcer. His usual Life-Bound Treasure was a bamboo flute, whose music he used to subdue his enemies. In truth, the world knew only how formidable his flute was, not that his swordsmanship was also exceptional. He might not rival a sword cultivator, but few cultivators of the same cultivation level who wielded swords could match him. Outwardly, he seemed as refined as a clear breeze beneath a bright moon, but his eternally stern disposition when carrying out missions had frightened off many young women.

Su Jiu and the others briefly recounted what had happened. After hearing the account, the newcomers first examined Yu Yin, who had already stopped breathing. An Inner Gate Disciple nodded to Xia Jue, confirming that she had died from a master-servant contract.

Xia Jue picked up a fragment of the Gourd from the ground, examined it for a while, and said evenly, "There's nothing we can do. Any soul left inside this Gourd for more than three days will be absorbed. Even if a released soul returns to its body, it will still lose a great deal of its essence, vitality, and spirit."

In other words, Qian Ling could no longer be saved.

One of the Inner Gate Disciples patted the weakened disciple on the shoulder and comforted him. "Rest and recuperate. Your soul wasn't inside for long. You should recover completely in about six months."

The man Su Jiu had rescued was overwhelmed by the unexpected kindness. These were Inner Gate Disciples standing before him, and an Inner Gate Disciple was comforting him! He almost felt he could endure another trip into the Gourd.

Of course, Su Jiu knew nothing of his bizarre train of thought. Still, the people serving under Xia Jue were indeed far better than those on the fringes of the Enforcement Hall.

The other Inner Gate Disciples also unearthed several Demonic Artifacts used by demonic cultivators in the cavern.

One object called Concealment Jade, however, was not a Demonic Artifact but a Spirit Artifact. Demonic cultivators could not use Spirit Artifacts, but for a Dao cultivator, this piece of Concealment Jade could conceal every trace of their aura, whether spiritual energy or demonic qi.

Su Jiu could more or less deduce how the demonic cultivator had taken Qian Ling's soul.

Through the master-servant contract, with Yu Yin carrying the Concealment Jade, he had instantly seized Qian Ling's soul while she was meditating and drawn it into the Gourd. However, this method consumed an enormous amount of divine sense. Each use required more than half a day of recovery, and it could not seize the soul of a cultivator whose cultivation exceeded Yu Yin's.

Another item was Soul-Attracting Incense. This was what Yu Yin had used on Han Jia. The demonic cultivator did not need to personally seize the soul through her. As long as Han Jia's soul left her body and was guided to the contract mark on Yu Yin's arm, there was a strong chance it would be captured.

The attempt had failed because Han Jia and Yu Yin shared the same cultivation level. Against a cultivator of equal cultivation, Soul-Attracting Incense had less than a fifty-percent chance of success. Han Jia had even reached the fourth Qi Refining layer some time before Yu Yin, making failure extremely likely. Ultimately, Yu Yin had simply been too greedy.

Aside from these items, the cavern also contained an intricate formation, hardly something a Qi Refining demonic cultivator should have possessed. This formation had already reached the second tier. It could seal off demonic qi, making its presence here entirely undetectable to cultivators below Foundation Establishment. Only when the formation's owner deliberately opened it to draw someone inside would a trace or two of demonic qi leak out.

After sorting through the cavern's Demonic Artifacts, Xia Jue placed them in a Storage Bag, intending to dispose of them together once he returned to the sect. Leaving such things in the world would only bring tremendous harm. Finally, he turned his attention to Su Jiu and glanced at her cultivation. He still found it hard to believe, though nothing showed on his face. "You killed this demonic cultivator?"

Su Jiu nodded.

Naturally, Xia Jue knew there was little chance Su Jiu was lying. After all, everyone else had said she had saved them. Their cultivation was higher than hers; they had no reason to tell such a lie.

"Cultivate diligently," Xia Jue said. He knew about this girl, especially since his master would sometimes mutter to him in private that, had she possessed a water spirit root, he would have fought tooth and nail to claim her as his disciple.

Xia Jue never begrudged encouragement to juniors with good talent, strong cultivation, and upright hearts who also enjoyed punishing evil and championing good. As for what Ice Veil Peak was thinking, even he could not quite fathom it.

Su Jiu bowed with clasped hands and watched Xia Jue lead the Enforcement Hall disciples away in a grand procession.

Elsewhere, three people talked as they ran toward Su Jiu and Mo Yan's location.

"What's going on? Why would the Enforcement Hall come here?" Zhou Xing was puzzled. Besides, what did the Enforcement Hall's arrival have to do with them? Shu Bai, in particular, seemed anxious.

"Shu Bai, what exactly happened?"

Shu Bai fell silent for a moment, then shook his head. "I was watching Su Jiu. After she entered the mountains, she kept looking southwest. I investigated that direction with my divine sense at the time, but found nothing."

Shu Bai paused, then continued, "But now even the Enforcement Hall has been drawn here, which means there really was something unusual over there. I'm not worried about Su Jiu's strength. It's just Mo Yan..."

Lie Changfeng's face paled slightly. "You two really know how to keep things bottled up! You insist on waiting until something happens before speaking!"

Shu Bai shook his head with a bitter smile. "I wasn't certain at the time, after all." He really had placed too much faith in his divine sense.

But thinking of it that way, did that not mean Su Jiu's divine sense was even stronger than his? He had been at the seventh Qi Refining layer for three years. All he needed was an opportunity to break through to the late Qi Refining stage. He had thought his divine sense was the strongest among them, but in the end, he had simply been arrogant.

Before they could reach their destination, however, they saw the Enforcement Hall members flying back overhead on their swords.

Lie Changfeng hardly knew what to say. "The Enforcement Hall is getting more efficient by the day."

After all, only the time it took an incense stick to burn had passed between Shu Bai and the others seeing them fly over and seeing them fly back.

Soon, the three reached their destination.