Su Zhiyun resignedly shut her mouth, clutching the bundle of incense sticks tightly in her arms and shrinking her head.
“Hold on tight!”
Jiu Baiyun hesitated no longer.
Before his words faded, he summoned more spiritual energy from within.
His speed first dipped, then surged forward even faster.
“Whoa—!”
Su Zhiyun let out a short cry of surprise as all her senses were turned upside down.
Even though she had mentally prepared herself the moment Jiu Baiyun spoke, the sudden acceleration still caught her off guard.
An intense push against her back and a feeling of weightlessness assaulted her violently.
Her heart lurched up to her throat, then slammed back down into her chest, bringing a dizzying suffocation.
The air around her turned into a solid wall, slapping hard against her face.
Her eyes couldn’t open under the wind pressure; she squeezed them shut, her long eyelashes trembling fiercely.
At this speed, even breathing became extremely difficult.
Jiu Baiyun noticed Su Zhiyun’s distress.
He frowned slightly.
While maintaining the high speed, he diverted a thread of his focus and traced a quick gesture with his fingertips.
A soft, invisible protective shield instantly formed around Su Zhiyun, precisely blocking out most of the violent airflow and wind pressure.
“Huff… cough, cough!”
The sudden influx of air into her lungs made Su Zhiyun cough violently, but the suffocating feeling of near-death finally disappeared.
After repeatedly confirming that the uncomfortable wind pressure was gone, Su Zhiyun finally tried to open her eyes.
Her vision was blurry; she could only feel the surrounding scenery rushing backward at a terrifying speed.
All she could hear was the howling wind and the grating screeches of “caw caw” behind her, which made her skin crawl.
She turned her head to look back.
The gray-white tide clung to them like a stubborn disease, biting at their heels less than ten zhang away.
This startled Su Zhiyun.
She had experienced Jiu Baiyun’s speed—the wind stung her face.
Logically… these mountain sparrows shouldn’t be able to keep up…
Compared to Su Zhiyun’s shock, Jiu Baiyun’s expression was more grim.
The Yao Fox Demon Venerable had long shared his perception with him.
He could sense that behind the flock of mountain sparrows, there was an even more sinister aura.
But the opponent remained still, yet its spread aura was maintained at a level that Jiu Baiyun could perceive.
He looked up at the sky, which was about to turn dark.
His heart grew heavier.
He couldn’t drag this out any longer.
First, he had to throw Su Zhiyun to a safe place…
After another burst of sprinting, an indistinct silhouette finally appeared in his sight.
The shrine!
Now!
“Su Zhiyun!”
Jiu Baiyun gave a low shout.
His voice pierced through the howling wind and clearly reached Su Zhiyun’s ears.
“Huh? Wh-what?”
Dazed and dizzy from the high-speed movement and the terrifying scene behind her, Su Zhiyun instinctively hugged the incense stick bundle tighter, her voice carrying a hint of panic.
Without any extra explanation, Jiu Baiyun suddenly halted and spun around, his movements fluid.
His left hand still steadily held Su Zhiyun by the back of her collar, while his right hand quickly formed a hand seal.
Spiritual light intertwined in deep blue and pale gold flickered at his fingertips.
Unlike the previous shield, this light appeared more resilient.
It quickly sketched a thin film of energy around Su Zhiyun, enveloping both her and the incense stick bundle.
“You’re going to…”
Su Zhiyun only managed to spit out a few words before she felt an irresistible force transmitted from Jiu Baiyun’s hand.
Jiu Baiyun narrowed his eyes, precisely calculating the distance and angle.
Then he channeled all the strength in his body into his arm, engaged his waist, and hurled Su Zhiyun, wrapped in the spiritual light film, forcefully toward the shrine.
“Take that!”
Su Zhiyun felt an immense force from her collar, pulling so hard it hurt.
Her entire body turned into a streak of light, shooting toward the shrine.
“Jiu Baiyun—!!!”
But her scream was torn apart by the howling wind, never reaching Jiu Baiyun’s ears.
In her field of vision, Jiu Baiyun’s figure, along with the overwhelming gray-white tide, was rapidly shrinking and blurring.
The speed of being thrown made her heart pound violently.
Out of fear, Su Zhiyun subconsciously closed her eyes, cursing Jiu Baiyun’s ancestors for eighteen generations in her mind.
At the same time, she frantically flipped through the system panel in her mind, trying to find a way to protect herself.
But soon, Su Zhiyun also noticed that Jiu Baiyun had added a layer of protection for her.
She cracked her eyes open slightly.
The pale golden spiritual light film wrapping around her rubbed violently against the air, emitting a faint hum.
But even though the film blocked most of the impact, it couldn’t completely eliminate the terror of high-speed flight.
She saw the treetops below whizzing past her feet, and the familiar fence and roof of the shrine rapidly enlarging in her vision.
Her heart was still in her throat.
“Bang!”
“Crack—!”
A muffled sound, not too violent, accompanied by the snapping of fence planks.
Wrapped in the film, Su Zhiyun, like a bowling ball, crashed through a weaker section of the fence around the shrine and tumbled into the open ground in front of the shrine.
In an instant, dust flew.
Under the immense impact, the incense stick bundle in her arms finally came apart, scattering yellow-paper-wrapped sandalwood sticks across the ground.
Su Zhiyun lay awkwardly on the ground.
The spiritual light film protecting her flickered a few times upon landing, then vanished.
“Cough… cough, cough…”
Su Zhiyun coughed violently, feeling as if all her bones had fallen apart, her internal organs churning.
Shallow bloody scratches stung painfully on her cheeks and arms from the rough ground and scattered dry branches.
“Miss Su?!”
A Ran’s crisp, surprised voice sounded.
“You…”
Before she could finish, A Ran also saw the mountain sparrows in the distant sky, almost blotting out the sun.
Su Zhiyun struggled to get up from the ground.
Ignoring the pain, she waved her hand lightly over the ground.
Under the system’s one-touch arrangement, the scattered sandalwood sticks quickly reformed into a bundle.
She turned her head and saw the figure in the sky luring the sparrows away.
She immediately understood Jiu Baiyun’s plan.
“Quick! Get inside! It’s dangerous out here!”
Then, facing A Ran’s confused and startled expression, Su Zhiyun, without time to explain, grabbed the incense stick bundle and pulled A Ran into the house.
“Brother Jiu… isn’t he coming back?”
Looking at Su Zhiyun, who was placing the incense stick bundle on the nearby table, A Ran asked worriedly.
Although she didn’t know the situation, A Ran had seen Su Zhiyun fall from the sky. But only Su Zhiyun—Jiu Baiyun was nowhere in sight.
Su Zhiyun paused, opened her mouth, hesitated, but finally chose to tell the truth.
“We ran into mountain sparrows on the way back. That entire patch of sky just now was all sparrows… Jiu Baiyun went to lure them away…”
Seeing A Ran’s increasingly worried expression, Su Zhiyun paused and then added, “Don’t worry, he’s a cultivator, you know!”
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