Xuantian Immortal Cultivation Record

The group resumed their journey, the atmosphere somewhat heavy. However, Wu Jixiong was truly a remarkable individual, leading the way while sharing amusing anecdotes, gradually lightening the mood once more.

As they continued, not only did the Yin Nether Qi grow denser, but the appearance of that eerie chill became more frequent, making it increasingly difficult to dispel. Zhang Yuanjing had already used over a dozen of his magical artifacts.

One day, in a tunnel approximately thirteen hundred zhang deep underground, they encountered the three rogue cultivators recruited by the Star Moon Sect. A fierce battle ensued, and the opponents retreated, but continued to follow them from a distance. The four set up ambushes several times, but the opponents detected them each time and successfully avoided them.

"This won't do. Among them, there must be a cultivator skilled in tracking, whether with a magical instrument or a spiritual beast, who has locked onto us. They are definitely contacting other Star Moon Sect cultivators. Once we're surrounded, we're doomed!" Wu Jixiong led the three to a spacious cavern, sat down against a corner of the cave wall, and said with a solemn tone.

"I recognize one of them. I believe it's Yun Zhongyan from Seven Stars Cave, one of the Three Mountains and Seven Caves, a ruthless character who is not easy to deal with!" Despite traveling swiftly for over a dozen miles through dense Yin Nether Qi, Qing Weihong's voice remained robust.

"Heavenly Pivot Sword Yun Zhongyan? That is indeed a bit troublesome!" Lin Dushan also said with a gloomy expression. "He once fought Zhong Bixing of the Heavy Sword Sect in Six Yue Immortal City. His sword was like lightning, his aura soaring to the heavens, truly formidable!"

Zhang Yuanjing asked curiously, "Who won?"

A hint of distress flashed across Wu Jixiong's jade-like face as he replied, "A draw. But in terms of swordsmanship alone, Yun Zhongyan was definitely superior. Alas, fellow Daoists, let's not discuss the Heavenly Pivot Sword. He's not the key. The crucial thing is, who exactly is the one skilled in tracking? And how do we get rid of him? If we can't kill him, even if we chop the Heavenly Pivot Sword into eight pieces, we still won't escape!"

Lin Dushan remained relaxed, speaking confidently, "There's only one way right now, and that is to continue deeper into the Profound Yin Cave. The further down we go, the denser the Yin Nether Qi becomes, and the greater the suppression on divine sense. Even if the Star Moon Sect people catch up to us, they won't dare to act rashly."

A trace of displeasure appeared on Wu Jixiong's face as he asked in a deep voice, "And then what? Just keep stalling like this?"

Lin Dushan appeared confident, replying immediately, "Of course not. We'll find a group of Yin Fire Bats and let them deal with them."

Qing Weihong said loudly, "Fellow Daoist Lin makes it sound easy. Why would the bats listen to you and only go after them and not come after us?"

Lin Dushan smiled mysteriously, "Fellow Daoist Wu, if I'm not mistaken, this Four Symbols Absolute Mechanism Formation can also isolate the spiritual aura of the person controlling the formation, right?"

Wu Jixiong's eyelids twitched violently, and he glanced at him in surprise, but his expression remained normal as he said, "Indeed. I didn't expect Fellow Daoist Lin's attainments in formations to be so high, to see through the mysteries of this formation at a glance. If we fix the formation flags and formation plate, and then a cultivator enters the formation's range, once the formation is activated, they will be trapped within and suffer the calamity of spiritual aura isolation. Fellow Daoist Lin wouldn't be thinking of using this to deceive the Yin Fire Bats and the pursuing cultivators, would you?"

Lin Dushan asked in return, "Is it not possible?"

Wu Jixiong spread his hands, saying somewhat helplessly, "It's not that it's impossible, but rather that it's extremely difficult. First, if we trap ourselves in the formation, we can't last long, otherwise our vitality will be greatly damaged. Second, once the formation is activated, it's not easy to deactivate it from within. If something goes wrong, we'll have to forcefully break out of the formation. Third, we don't know how the other party is tracking us. If their methods are miraculous and they can still lock onto us even under the Absolute Mechanism, then we'll be spinning a cocoon around ourselves, handing our heads over to them for the reward."

Lin Dushan looked around at the three and asked again, "If this method won't work, what better ideas do you have?"

Qing Weihong chuckled and said to Wu Jixiong, "I think this method is feasible. Fellow Daoist Wu, there's no need to worry, we believe you can control the formation well!"

Wu Jixiong gave a wry smile and didn't say anything, which counted as tacit agreement.

Zhang Yuanjing sensed that the relationship between Lin Dushan and Wu Jixiong seemed somewhat subtle, but it didn't seem like they were plotting against him and Qing Weihong, so he echoed, "If there's no better way, I also agree with this method. We might as well give it a try."

Thus, within ten days, the four traveled swiftly for dozens of miles, descending another thousand zhang or so. This place was already the limit of where they could reach. The Yin Nether Qi was as dense as rain, and they had to cover their entire bodies with magical power to prevent it from invading their bodies. Divine sense was suppressed to the extreme, able to extend only five or six zhang around them.

Zhang Yuanjing's divine soul was two to three times stronger than that of an average Great Perfection cultivator, but in terms of the range of divine sense, it was only a little more than double.

Upon reaching this place, Wu Jixiong became especially cautious. His divine sense could only reach five zhang around him, and discovering the icy chill at this distance was very dangerous. Therefore, he took out a stack of low-grade, inferior Earth Wall Talismans from his storage bag. Whenever he encountered the icy chill, he would first throw out a talisman to slightly resist it, and then join forces with the other three to dispel the qi.

After searching for more than a day, the Azure Monkey finally reacted again. This time, they chose a large cave, seventy or eighty zhang in circumference, as the place to set up the formation.

Wu Jixiong took out an Azure Monkey, cut open the blood vessels on its leg, sprinkled a patch of blood on a cave wall, bandaged the wound, and put it back into the spirit beast pouch. The group hid in the formation, activated it, and each held spirit stones, circulating their energy to maintain an unbroken spiritual aura around them. However, the spiritual aura was now isolated inside and outside the formation.

After twenty or thirty breaths, they heard a buzzing sound, and a dark mass of flying insects squeezed together and entered the cave. It was a swarm of Yin Fire Bats, about two hundred in number, with the leader being a Yin Fire Bat at the late stage of Spirit Awakening, and more than twenty other bat demons at the early and middle stages of Spirit Awakening.

This group of Yin Fire Bats was several times stronger than the last one. Even with the protection of the formation, the four were shocked.

The bat swarm landed on the bloodstains and eagerly sucked the Azure Monkey's blood with their small mouths. The Blood Tempering Yin Fire Bats fought for position, biting and clawing at each other from time to time, splattering blood.

After a few breaths, the bloodstains in the soil faded. More than twenty Spirit Awakening Yin Fire Bats flapped their wings and flew up, searching the cave. The four stopped their cultivation, completely cutting off their spiritual aura. After circling a few times, the Yin Fire Bats saw nothing unusual and led the group of Blood Tempering bat demons out of the cave, disappearing into the dark cave tunnel.

Wu Jixiong stopped the formation, took out another Azure Monkey, changed to another location, sprinkled another patch of blood, and returned to the formation, activating it again.

In less than ten breaths, the group of Yin Fire Bats flew into the cave again. They still fought for the blood first, and then searched the cave environment. This also showed that even when the Yin Fire Bats reached the late stage of Spirit Awakening, instinct still prevailed over intelligence.

However, by the third time, the Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat, as the leader of the swarm, finally realized something was wrong. After flying into the cave, it let the Blood Tempering offspring eat the blood, while it led more than twenty Spirit Awakening early and mid-stage Yin Fire Bats to inspect the cave everywhere.

However, Wu Jixiong's Four Symbols Absolute Mechanism Formation was indeed extraordinary. The more than twenty bat demons flew over the formation several times, just a few feet above it, but did not notice anything unusual.

After the Blood Tempering bat demons finished eating the blood, the Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat did not immediately lead the fire bats away. Instead, it hung upside down on the top of the cave, motionless, as if it had entered a dream.

It hung there for a full two hours. Because the bats were nearby, Zhang Yuanjing and the others did not dare to use spirit stones to maintain the circulation of spiritual energy around their bodies. As time went on, they felt stifled, and the magical power in their bodies was consumed exponentially.

Fortunately, the people they were waiting for finally arrived. With the Yin Fire Bats' talent, they had actually discovered the approaching cultivators long ago. However, the Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat leader thought that these people were the ones who came to this cave to pour blood, so it simply ambushed in the cave, waiting for them to come.

Among these people, there was indeed a rogue cultivator who was good at tracking. He had a wood-attribute magical instrument that was good at collecting the other party's aura, which could be stored for a long time without dissipating, and could be used to track the opponent's whereabouts. Previously, the aura of Zhang Yuanjing and the others in this cave had been intermittent, which made this person a little suspicious.

When the Yin Fire Bats stayed in the cave and the four people's aura disappeared for a long time, this person panicked, thinking that they had been killed by the Yin Fire Bat swarm. He hurriedly led the other three people—one of whom had joined later—to check the situation, hoping to pick up some heads.

As soon as the four entered the cave, a dark cloud of bats came rushing towards them, pressing down on their heads.

"Yin Fire Bats! Don't retreat, form a defensive formation!"

The first person, who was the one skilled in tracking, instinctively turned around to flee when he saw the bat swarm. A slender cultivator behind him shouted loudly, then waved his hand and sacrificed a silver long sword, flying into the center of the bat swarm, flashing several electric lights, knocking down more than a dozen Yin Fire Bats that rushed close. At the same time, he also held a black sword in his hand, quickly killing the Yin Fire Bats approaching him.

Beside him, another tall cultivator also quickly stood his ground, sacrificing eighteen red flying needles. With the flashing of the needles, like hundreds of red threads twitching, the bats in the sky were injured upon touching them and died upon being pierced. In a short time, twenty or thirty bats landed.

The other two also steadied their minds and sacrificed their spiritual weapons to fight. These two were slightly weaker in combat power. They threw out a large number of spiritual talismans, either defending or attacking, and managed to hold on.

Before long, the bat swarm became sparse. More than half of the Blood Tempering Yin Fire Bats were killed or injured, and four or five of the Spirit Awakening ones were also injured.

The Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat shrieked twice, and more than a hundred bat demons echoed in unison, emitting a terrifying sound wave.

The sword-wielding cultivator and the needle-wielding cultivator had been prepared for this and immediately patted out a middle-grade, intermediate-quality Vajra Talisman each, and stuffed a ball of white cotton-like material into their ears, so they were not affected by the sound wave.

However, the other two cultivators reacted more slowly and had no defensive items. When the sound wave struck, they immediately clutched their heads, screamed, and fell to the ground, twitching.

This was because the rogue cultivators under the Star Moon Sect entered the Profound Yin Cave with the purpose of killing people, so the preparations against the Yin Fire Bats varied depending on each person's considerations. Although these two had prepared some items to deal with the Yin Fire Bats, they were ultimately not complete enough.

The sword-wielding cultivator and the needle-wielding cultivator had no time to care about them. They danced their hand seals and desperately attacked the Yin Fire Bats that were releasing the sound wave. Finally, the Yin Fire Bats dispersed their formation, stopped the sound wave, and instead spat out green Yin Fire from all directions.

The two were calm and composed, without any panic. They only guarded their positions tightly, dodging most of the Yin Fire as they flashed and moved in the cave. Even if some Yin Fire slipped through the net and hit them, it was blocked by the protective golden light and did not cause any damage.

Once the golden light dimmed, the two patted out another Vajra Talisman. After supporting it for more than ten breaths, the Blood Tempering Yin Fire Bats were greatly damaged and stopped spitting out Yin Fire. The two gained some leeway and began to control their spiritual weapons to slaughter the bat demons.

At this time, more than a dozen Spirit Awakening Yin Fire Bats, with the Spirit Awakening late-stage leader at the head, surrounded the two and spat out blue Yin Fire. However, it was not in large clumps, but rather in spots, like hundreds of blue flying knives, enveloping the two.

"Brother Tong, you in the back, me in the front!" the sword-wielding cultivator shouted. With a wave of his right hand, two swords appeared in the air, one silver and one black. The silver sword flashed with electric light, and the black sword shot out a faint light. Blue and white intertwined, colliding with the Yin Fire, making a series of bangs and annihilating each other.

Looking at the cultivator using flying needles, the red threads became more and more fierce, covering a large area, constantly piercing and whipping at the blue Yin Fire, extinguishing all the Yin Fire that came close.

After a while, the Yin Fire weakened. The Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat screamed again and spat out Yin Fire repeatedly. The remaining ten or so bat demons also tried their best, and the blue fire in the air became stronger again, slowly suppressing the sword light and red threads. The two cultivators were sweating on their foreheads, their faces pale, and their magical power was mostly consumed. It was difficult for them to hold on.

"Brother Yun, use the talismans! Don't hold back," the needle-wielding cultivator shouted.

In order to encourage these rogue cultivators to kill enemies, the Star Moon Sect issued four low-grade defensive talismans and six offensive talismans to each person. The defensive ones were all of middle and low quality, while the offensive ones had two of high quality, which was considered a generous gesture. The "talismans" that the cultivator surnamed Tong was referring to were naturally high-grade spiritual talismans.

"Alright, let's use them together!" the cultivator surnamed Yun replied. This person was none other than the Heavenly Pivot Sword Yun Zhongyan from Seven Stars Cave of the Three Mountains and Seven Caves.

The two each took out two talismans, both Fire Explosion Talismans and Golden Sword Talismans, two in the front and two in the back. The fire was raging, and the sword energy was fierce, instantly scattering the sky of blue light. The two were overjoyed, their spiritual weapons flew out, and they took advantage of the situation to attack. With a series of hissing sounds, three or four early-stage Spirit Awakening Yin Fire Bats were hit and landed.

The Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat, as the leader of the swarm, let out an even more shrill and terrifying scream. The remaining sixty or seventy Blood Tempering Yin Fire Bats gathered around and began to attack with sound waves again. However, the bat swarm at this time was also at the end of its rope. The sound waves failed to harm the two cultivators who had stuffed white cotton balls into their ears. Instead, they were seized upon by the two, who killed many of them.

The bat swarm dispersed and used its speed to attack at close range. The two each used a low-grade, inferior-quality Vajra Talisman, stubbornly resisting the sharp teeth and claws, and desperately killing the bats. The two also knew that with their current magical power, if they couldn't hold on, they wouldn't be able to escape the pursuit at all. They simply stood their ground and fought to the death, hoping for a glimmer of hope.

This group of Yin Fire Bats, having been slaughtered by the two, was also bloodthirsty. Although they were exhausted, they were still unwilling to retreat. Instead, they flew towards the two like moths to a flame. The two were panting like cows, their bodies were weak, and the magical power in their dantian had bottomed out. They were relying purely on their indomitable will to support themselves.

Just as both sides were caught in a dilemma and unable to continue, a sudden and drastic fluctuation of spiritual energy appeared in a corner of the cave. When the two cultivators and the bat swarm dodged their opponents and looked over in surprise, they saw four cultivators in that place. Their faces were pale, and the aura around them was strong but chaotic. They were staring at them (it) with bright eyes!

The Spirit Awakening late-stage Yin Fire Bat screamed and took the lead in flying towards a cave entrance on the side. The other Yin Fire Bats flapped their wings and followed. The two cultivators reacted even faster, immediately turning around and fleeing in the direction they had come from.

Wu Jixiong took two steps in pursuit, but felt his breathing was unstable and stopped quickly. He turned to the other three and smiled bitterly, "The taste of spiritual aura isolation is really not good!"