"Boom!"
Before Gu Qingcheng could think it through, a boulder suddenly fell from the sky, smashing straight toward where she stood.
At the last possible instant, Gu Qingcheng pushed hard against the ground with both feet and shot upward with a whoosh, landing steadily on an ancient tree not far ahead.
"Bang!"
The next moment, the boulder smashed a deep crater into the spot where she had stood.
Still shaken, Gu Qingcheng wiped the cold sweat from her forehead.
But she had only just steadied herself when she suddenly felt the sky above her darken.
Then came a pattering rush like falling rain, but when Gu Qingcheng looked closely at those "raindrops," she abruptly discovered that they were not rainwater at all, but drops of scalding oil.
"Aah!"
In an instant, heartrending screams once again rang out throughout the mountain forest.
Refugees fell in droves. Some were even scalded by the hot oil until flesh stripped from bone, dying in utter agony.
"Boom!"
With no other choice, Gu Qingcheng mobilized her true essence, using her protective true qi to block the scalding oil pouring down overhead, then tried to continue running toward the forest's western exit.
But she immediately discovered that her protective true qi could not hold out for even a moment before the hot oil dripped through it.
At the same time, the true essence within her began draining at a visibly discernible rate.
"This... this place not only weakens true qi's defensive power, but also accelerates the depletion of true essence?"
Gu Qingcheng looked stunned.
She had no choice but to stop and mobilize her true essence with all her strength, casting an ice armor spell to encase herself in ice crystals.
What she had not expected was that the ice armor spell, which she could normally