Retreat at Once
Lin Xiao glanced at him and smiled, "Why would I need you to go through fire and water? Just continue being my tour guide and showing me around this place once you've recovered."
About fifteen minutes later, Jiang Qu felt that his injuries had healed by at least ten or twenty percent. Just as he was adjusting his posture to sit more comfortably, he suddenly heard a rather anxious and authoritative voice coming from Cloud Gathering City: "Everyone, evacuate immediately! The farther the better!"
The sound echoed in everyone's ears, and Lin Xiao naturally heard it too.
The owner of this voice seemed to be the senior he had met before who had given him the Silver Moon Longbow.
Sensing the urgency in the senior's tone, Lin Xiao didn't dare to hesitate and immediately picked up Jiang Qu again and ran away.
No one present dared to disobey orders, especially the people from the Supreme Splendor Sect, who acted particularly swiftly, summoning various large spirit ships to transfer all the wounded aboard and prepare to leave.
Only about five breaths after they left, a deafening explosion resounded through the sky!
Even though Lin Xiao had run quite a distance, he could still clearly feel a strong shockwave coming from him, making his scalp tingle.
He glanced back and saw a huge, dark mushroom cloud rising in the distant sky, its top merging with the descending clouds above.
The thirty-two Void Return cultivators flew into the sky, their figures appearing and disappearing in the mushroom cloud. They formed a circle in the air, as if surrounding something below.
The thirty-two Void Return cultivators all stood solemnly, their bodies tense, poised for attack as if ready to strike at any moment, looking as if facing a formidable enemy.
The next second, several deep, muffled roars came from underground in Cloud Gathering City.
The voice was deep and hoarse, yet it pierced straight into people's hearts, making them tremble with fear.
The roar was accompanied by a massive earthquake, causing all living things on the ground to shake violently. The Cloud Gathering City, where the roar originated, suffered a complete collapse of its walls. In just a few moments, what was once a bustling and vibrant city was reduced to ruins, with only devastation remaining amidst the thick dust kicked up by the explosion.
Lin Xiao saw several spirit ships behind him shake violently a few times after being affected by the roar and the shockwave, and then they plummeted vertically as if they had completely lost control!
At the same time, Jiang Qu, who was on his back, suddenly vomited a mouthful of blood, which flowed down Lin Xiao's neck and into his collar.
Lin Xiao quickly increased the input of his Origin Qi to protect Jiang Qu's heart meridian. Then, he immediately used all the remaining Origin Power in his body to protect the spirit ship closest to him, allowing it to land safely.
But he was powerless to do anything about the spirit ships that followed. He could only watch helplessly as they plummeted to the ground, their hulls shattering.
Everyone inside the ship was thrown out. The Golden Core and Nascent Soul Cultivator who came to the rescue were all relatively unharmed. Although they were all injured after the crash, their Divine Sense Spiritual Power and physical condition were originally in good condition. After a brief moment of disorientation, they regained their senses and healed their injuries.
However, those cultivators who had just been rescued from Cloud Gathering City and were already severely injured were not so lucky. The spirit ship crashed and shattered, and the impact of the sound itself made them even more vulnerable than ordinary people who had never cultivated. This incident directly led to the deaths of most of them.
Only the group of people on the ship that Lin Xiao protected with all his might survived.
"Boom--!"
Another loud bang followed, and a powerful yet extremely unsettling aura was rapidly released from beneath Cloud Gathering City.
Lin Xiao clearly sensed that something was about to emerge!
Jiang Qu, who had vomited a mouthful of blood, was barely breathing. Lin Xiao glanced at the thirty-two Void Return seniors in the distance and immediately decided to land on the spot to continue healing Jiang Qu.
He had thought it through clearly. With those Void Return seniors around, they could deal with whatever came out. They were also far away now, making it less likely for them to be affected by the battle. Jiang Qu, on the other hand, was clearly at his limit and couldn't afford to drag things out any longer. If they couldn't even handle the thirty-two Void Returning Realm seniors, then they wouldn't be able to escape either.
Of course, if his life is truly in danger, he can use the Heaven and Earth Shift Disc to teleport back to the sect.
He didn't use it before because there were many people around and it wasn't a necessary situation, so he didn't want to expose the Heaven and Earth Shift Disc, such a treasure.
The reason he didn't use the Heaven and Earth Shift Disc to teleport to a safer area with Jiang Qu wasn't because he was stingy with Spirit Stone, but because Jiang Qu was currently in such a fragile state that he was worried Jiang Qu wouldn't be able to withstand the spatial distortion power during teleportation. Although the spatial distortion power of using the Heaven and Earth Shift Disc had a very small impact on people, it wasn't nonexistent.
While treating Jiang Qu, Lin Xiao also kept an eye on the situation in Cloud Gathering City.
Given their current distance from Cloud Gathering City, they can only vaguely see the sky above with the naked eye; to see the complete details, they would have to use their Divine Sense.
Even with Divine Sense, the vision was somewhat blurry.
After all, he was only a Nascent Soul cultivator, and the range of his Divine Sense was already at its limit.
Within his Divine Sense, he could see a huge, black, semi-circular object protruding from the ground beneath Cloud Gathering City. The next moment, the ground in the city cracked further, and the black, semi-circular object began to slowly rise.
The ascent speed wasn't actually slow; it was just that the thing was so enormous that it appeared to be moving very slowly from a distance.
The thirty-two Void Return cultivators in the sky did not immediately make a move; their eyes were fixed on this thing.
At their level, they don't act rashly. Blindly attacking before finding the opponent's weakness can easily deplete their own strength and may even have no effect on the opponent, resulting in a waste of effort. Finding the weakness and opportunity to strike decisively is their way of fighting.
As the black thing slowly emerged from the ground, Lin Xiao realized that it wasn't a semi-circle at all, but a black, round head!
This 'thing' was entirely black, without hair or facial features, only some vague outlines, just like the little black figure in a certain Bleach anime, only a super-giant version.
In just a moment, the 'thing' emerged completely from underground.
Suddenly, a colossal, black, humanoid figure stood between heaven and earth. It seemed to be formed from a massive black mist, concealing everything beneath it. Its powerful aura swept over like a silent wave, instantly stunning anyone with lower cultivation levels.