No Spirit Chi.
More accurately, the concentration of Spirit Chi in the air was outrageously low. In its place, a thick, nearly viscous dark red gas filled the heavens and earth.
Demonic Chi.
If it were the inner Wu Yan standing here, she would be ecstatic. With such an abundance of Demonic Chi, even cultivating for just 1 or 2 hours would be far more effective than an entire day of cultivation outside.
Wu Yan immediately stopped her attempt to draw Spiritual Power from the air.
A normal Righteous Cultivator absorbing too much Demonic Chi wouldn’t just be unable to convert it; it would contaminate their sea of chi and erode their sanity, leading to Chi Deviation. Consequently, managing the Spiritual Power currently stored in her body was of paramount importance.
Wu Yan quickly assessed her own condition.
The brilliant Golden Core inside her was slightly dim, and about 70% of her originally full Spiritual Power remained. In a place like this, Spiritual Power was a non-renewable resource. Every subsequent use had to be handled with extreme caution.
Wu Yan slowed the flow of her Spiritual Power, cutting out unnecessary consumption as much as possible. Her primary mission now was to find a way out, locate her companions, and help others along the way if possible.
Under the dim, yellowish sunlight, Wu Yan looked exceptionally lonely. Within that silence, danger lurked everywhere.
Sharp claws suddenly lunged toward Wu Yan’s back, their movement so light they were completely masked by the sound of the wind. Wu Yan ducked just in time, simultaneously unsheathing Wu Nian and swinging it horizontally.
Even without Spiritual Power, Wu Nian was incredibly sharp—far beyond most weapons. With a single strike, the assailant was sliced in half at the waist. It wasn’t blood that sprayed out, but molten lava. If Wu Yan hadn’t dodged in time, that falling lava would have turned her into ‘Roasted Yan.’
The lower half of the slain attacker consisted of naked, savage legs. Its muscle groups were as dense as those of a steroid-pumped muscle-head from her past life, and it possessed no physiological characteristics. Its upper half was even more terrifying. Overly muscular, it had an eerie inverted triangular head. Cloudy, squinted eyes sat at the very bottom of its head, while two black holes occupied the space where a nose should be. Its mouth split open to an exaggerated degree, filled with jagged fangs as sharp as spearheads.
Its hands had only three fingers—short and jointless—but the nails were long, sharp, and possessed a metallic sheen.
A Blazing Flame Demon.
They were the lowest tier of the Demon Realm, the most numerous, and the most troublesome creatures for the Righteous Path during wars between good and evil. These creatures had no intelligence and lived only to fight.
Rustle—rustle—
Friction sounds came from all directions. Within moments, six Blazing Flame Demons surrounded Wu Yan. The thick, pungent stench of the demons invaded her nostrils, causing a wave of physical discomfort.
The next second, Wu Yan lunged forward. Her longsword thrust out, kicking up a milky-white wave of air from the tip. One Flame Demon’s chest instantly collapsed, and thick lava overflowed from its mouth, flowing back into its ugly, squinted eyes.
Having made her move, Wu Yan wasn’t satisfied with just one strike. Using the momentum of the impact, she spun quickly, her sword slicing upward to cleave another Flame Demon in two.
When a Flame Demon’s claws on her left threatened to tear her throat, she leaned back and threw a left elbow strike. The demon’s claws collided with another demon, producing a jarring skreech.
Wu Yan didn’t miss the opportunity. As the two demons collided, she swung her sword simply, leaving four more severed body parts on the ground. She hadn’t used any Spiritual Power; she completed this rapid offensive using only her physical attributes and basic skills.
The remaining two Flame Demons intended to use the terrain for a flanking maneuver, but seeing her terrifying strength, they fled without looking back. It turned out Flame Demons didn’t just know how to fight; at least they knew when to run.
Wu Yan didn’t chase blindly. She was in an unfamiliar place; falling into a trap wasn’t worth the risk. With a flick of her wrist, she shook off the remaining lava from Wu Nian. The blade remained as unremarkable as ever, showing no change.
‘It is truly worthy of being forged from rare iron,’ she thought. It had remained perfectly intact after accompanying her from the Five Sects Tournament until now.
The longsword slid back into its sheath with a click that echoed across the wasteland. ‘Even if I can’t use Spiritual Power freely, what does it matter? As long as I have a sword in hand, I can kill my enemies.’
Relying on sharp intuition—perhaps a strange sensory ability developed from spending too much time with the inner Wu Yan—she could sense the fluctuations of Demonic Chi in the air. There were only low-level Blazing Flame Demons here, so the Demonic Chi was weak. The direction where the fluctuations were intense meant more powerful monsters, but also “outliers.”
In other words, people.
Wu Yan set off. Her black dress with gold trim fluttered in the wind, pressing against her legs to reveal a perfect silhouette. Her black boots stepped onto the carbonized earth with steady, powerful strides.
She walked for about 30 minutes. The ground suddenly began to vibrate rhythmically. In this dim wasteland, sound traveled much farther than sight.
Thud! Boom! Thud!
It sounded like drums or muffled thunder. Each vibration caused the loose rocks on the ground to dance.
There was someone there.
Wu Yan pressed her palm to the ground to sense the source of the tremors while identifying the flow and concentration of Demonic Chi.
Northwest.
To make this much noise in an environment with such thin Spirit Chi, it had to be a Body Cultivator. When she thought of Body Cultivators, she instinctively thought of Lin Xiao and Manba.
She dashed toward the source.
“Hahaha, how satisfying!”
Crossing a small hill of carbonized rock, Wu Yan heard a familiar, hearty shout. Below the hill was a basin where a burly cultivator was attacking a group of meat-sac monsters.
It was Lin Xiao.
The dark yellow pus spat out by the Meat-sac Monsters hit Lin Xiao’s bronze skin and slid off as if it had hit porcelain, dealing zero damage. Indeed, Lin Xiao fit the description of a Body Cultivator perfectly.
Wu Yan leaped, landing lightly behind a Meat-sac Monster and thrusting her sword. Foul liquid flowed out of the monster, and its body shrank rapidly until it was just a loose layer of skin.
“Eldest Senior Sister?” Lin Xiao’s gravelly voice sounded like heavenly music at that moment. “How did you find me?”
“No time for catching up. Focus on the enemy,” Wu Yan replied.
“Alright, you got it!”
Lin Xiao sank his knees and then lunged forward like a human weapon, a sonic boom trailing behind him like a physical wave of air. Wu Yan had to admit that Body Cultivators were like fish in water in this environment.
“Explode for me!!”
Lin Xiao reached a Meat-sac Monster, thrust his hands directly into its body, and tore it apart. Yellow, green, and fragmented flesh flew everywhere. Disgusting pus erupted from the wounds, drenching Lin Xiao in a foul smell.
Instead of being disgusted, Lin Xiao looked even more excited.
“Refreshing! It’s been a long time since I’ve had such handy targets!”
Lin Xiao grabbed the skin of another Meat-sac Monster, his veins bulging on his thick arms. With a surge of strength, he literally peeled the monster alive. It was a bloody scene.