Gradually, the blood shadow beneath the blood moon expanded to the size of a mountain peak.
The enormous blood shadow unleashed extremely frightening fluctuations of Qi and blood, making all of the guests inside the valley feel as if their Qi and blood weren’t flowing smoothly.
HISS! HISS!
Rays of blood-colored moonlight that seemed like long, silky rivers of blood poured down in torrents from the round blood moon.
When they approached the ground, it was as though each and every one of them had turned into a blood-colored meteor, plummeting to the earth.
On the glittering, blood-colored lotus seat, the blurry figure of the woman seemed to be making a hand seal to activate a secret technique, before the enormous blood shadow suddenly let out a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering roar.
The minute the roar echoed out, the plummeting blood-colored meteors became even redder and their tails became even longer.
BOOOOM!! BOOOOM!!
The dark-red meteors started to bombard the Spiritual Treasure sect’s Heaven Burning Earth Flame grand formation.
Countless, densely packed, flaming patterns appeared on the bright, fiery s.h.i.+eld. They exploded and shattered into pieces, but rapidly regrouped only a second later.
At the same time, an even more violent tremor erupted from the core of the earth. Streams of blazing flames rushed straight into the sky from the three stone mountains peaks that were in three corners of the valley.
All of the guests in the valley, together with Qi warriors from the Spiritual school and Treasure school, were looking up at the sky with intense anxiety written across their faces.
Liu Yan was already trying to decide whether or not he should lead Nie Tian and the others to evacuate the moment the blazing s.h.i.+eld was chiseled open. “I’m afraid that the Heaven Burning Earth Flame won’t hold up for too much longer. That deadly woman from the Blood sect is going all out. From the look of it, the might of her spell can shake the heavens and alter the earth.”
Just like Dowager Weng, he also believed that the Spiritual Treasure sect wouldn’t be able to escape doom this time, and he thus started to make plans for his fellow sectmembers.
“The senior expert from the Ghost sect will probably have also made his move. Unfortunately… we don’t know what means he will use to attack the Heaven Burning Earth Flame formation.” s.h.i.+ Yi’s gaze was s.h.i.+fting swiftly back and forth, as if he was searching for something.
Meanwhile...
At the foot of a stone peak, there was a solitary stone house, under which a dark and lengthy stone path led directly to the deepest part of the earth.
In a vast stone palace hall, hundreds of meters under the ground, Wei Ning’s expression flickered. He was the second most powerful among the equipment forging experts in the Treasure school, and one of the few experts who was able to refine Premium grade spirit tools.
As a high-ranked equipment forger, he had recently been researching the method of refining Spirit Channeling items, and wholeheartedly focused on forging one.
Normally, there were two ways to craft Spirit Channeling items.
The first method was to use materials with a rich spiritual nature to make spiritual tools. During the last step of tempering, refining, and shaping, the spiritual tool would naturally be vested with spiritual nature and develop intelligence.
Only equipment forgers at the Spirit Channeling level would be able to grab the true essence of this method.
However, Wei Ning wasn’t there yet. The means that he had adopted were to directly force a spirit to merge into an item, therefore giving the item a soul.
In order to achieve his goal, he had gone through great pains to collect seven powerful spirits, all of which were prepared for the purpose of endowing the spiritual tool with a soul.
Now, the seven powerful spirits were tied up by countless fine thunder chains, and confined within seven separated special containers.
FIZZ! FIZZ!
The thunder chains glowed with electricity and lightning from time to time. The seven spirits seemed to be holding on to their last breath and absolutely didn’t have the intention rebelling.
However, for some reason, the seven spirits, which were tied up by the thunder chains and confined within the special containers, seemed to have suddenly possessed a strange, formidable power.
They went berserk and frantically rammed into the specially made containers, completely disregarding the thunder chains that had been binding them.
On the surface of the gla.s.s containers, delicately patterns suddenly appeared, giving rise to a strong surge of restrictive force.
However, those seven spirits ignored the restrictive spell, and continued to ram into the containers. As the result, one of the containers suddenly cracked, forming a small opening, through which the spirit within flew out like a wisp of smoke.
As soon as it flew out, a surge of cold, damp soul power immediately enveloped the entire stone palace.
A confused look flashed across Wei Ning’s eyes, as a deadly thought suddenly floated in his heart.
BAM! BAM!
The moment his mind swayed, each and every one of the remaining six containers exploded into pieces.
In blink of an eye, the remaining six spirits broke free from their imprisonment and turned into six terrifying ghosts, forcefully boring their way into his head from his ears, eyes, and nostrils.
Only after a few seconds, Wei Ning lost all signs of life, and his soul seemed to have been nibbled away with nothing left.
The seven spirits that had been imprisoned hundreds of meters underground, had struggled free from their bindings and suddenly appeared in the valley.
They targeted the nearest equipment forgers as soon as they got out.
“Spirits have flown out from underground!”
“Those spirits are the ones that elder Wei Ning spent an enormous price on and got from other realms! They broke free of their bindings and seem to be controlled by the Ghost sect!”
“Elder Wei Ning is probably dead!”
Some equipment forgers knew that when Wei Ning had obtained the seven spirits, they had been s.h.i.+pped to this place with layers upon layers of shackles on them.
It was because even Wei Ning himself knew that without the layers of constraint binding the spirits down, he wasn’t strong enough to contend against them single-handedly.
The spirits breaking free meant that Wei Ning, who was ranked second in the Treasure school, was very likely dead.
The equipment forgers were howling miserably or yelling loudly while fleeing in all directions.
The spirits, on the other hand, were swiftly floating about, pursuing and attacking people all over the valley by breaking into their minds and feeding on their souls.
Pan Tao’s father, Pan Bai, roared out angrily from within a stone pavilion quite a distance away. “They’re deadly spirits from the Realm of Dark Underworld. Did Wei Ning lose his mind? He actually dared to purchase spirits from the Dark Underground Realm!”
Nie Tian noticed that a few Qi warriors of the Spiritual school suddenly rushed out from Pan Bai’s direction to attack the seven deadly spirits from the Dark Underground Realm.
BOOM!
In that moment, the woman, who was sitting upright on a lotus, mounted the enormous blood shade and together viciously charged into the blazing s.h.i.+eld.
Nie Tian was so shocked by the sound of the explosion that his eardrums hurt. He looked up and realized that the flaming patterns on the protective s.h.i.+eld had failed to immediately reform after the tremendous blow.
Many visitors who were looking up at the sky in the streets went pale, knowing that the situation was taking a turn for the worse.
“This is not good!”
“It’s going to break!”
SHEW!
Wu Xing suddenly showed up. He rushed over and shouted out, “All of the inter-s.p.a.cial teleportation portal in the Spiritual Treasure sect have been affected by the abnormal fluctuations of s.p.a.ce, and have stopped working.”
“So what do we do, master?” Luo Xin asked loudly.
Only then did Wu Xing see that Dowager Weng was also there. He only briefly nodded in her direction before continuing, “I’m afraid that we can’t stay in the Spiritual Treasure sect any longer.”
Dowager Weng agreed with him.
“Let’s move closer to the edge of the spell formation. If the Heaven Burning Earth Fire grand formation is breached, experts from the Ghost sect and Blood sect will swarm in. By then, we can only take the risk and try to break out of their siege.” Wu Xing didn’t wish to perish along with the Spiritual Treasure sect, so he urged everyone to follow him.
Under his lead, Nie Tian, Jiang Lingzhu, Ye Gumo, and the others dashed downstairs and immediately left.
Numerous disciples from Spiritual Treasure sect’s subordinate clans, as well as Qi warriors from the Spiritual school and Treasure school, were clamoring in the streets as they all felt the incoming danger.
Pan Bai seemed to have noticed the movements of Wu Xing and the others from afar.
He suddenly pulled his son, Pan Tao, to the side and with a voice that only Pan Tao could hear, he said, “Tao’er, go with people from the Cloudsoaring sect and Mystic Mist sect, and get as far away as possible from the Spiritual Treasure sect. Your grandfather and I hold important positions in the sect. We have to stay and fight, but you don’t have to.”
“No!” Pan Tao’s eyes turned red. “I want to stay with you!”
“Go!” Pan Bai’s voice was filled with rage. “Get the h.e.l.l out of here! Our sect has been struck by a sudden calamity. I don’t know how many people will be killed. But I don’t care about others, I just need you alive!
“Get the h.e.l.l out! If you want to do something for us, then you should get out of here alive and inform the other three sects about the sudden upheaval which has occurred in the Spiritual Treasure sect as soon as possible!
“If the other three sects are informed in time and send out all of their powerful experts, we might still have a chance to survive!
“Go! You’re not escaping. You’re bringing reinforcements and the chance to live! Now go!”
Pan Bai continuously urged Pan Tao, fearing that Wu Xing and the others might have gone far enough that his son wouldn’t be able to catch up to them.
Pan Tao gritted his teeth and stared deep into his father’s eyes for a few seconds, before he finally nodded vigorously, and without saying a word, dashed out at the fastest speed possible to catch up to Wu Xing and the others.
At the same time...
In the secluded courtyard where An s.h.i.+yi and her younger sister lived, An Ying was looking at the sky, her eyes filled with terror. She had long since sunk into a state of utter stupefaction as she repeatedly asked the same question, “Elder Sister, what should we do? What should we do?”
An s.h.i.+yi’s delicate face had also turned pale. Staring blankly at the blazing s.h.i.+eld that had more and more visible cracks on it, she muttered, “There’s nothing to do. Guests from the Cloudsoaring sect, Mystic Mist sect, and Grayvale sect don’t have the obligation to stay and guard our sect to the end. Plus, we are not like Pan Tao and Zheng Rui. We’re from a subordinate clan.
“If we dare to leave when the sect is going through such a heaven-shaking change, can you imagine the punishment we’ll receive? We might as well die here now.
“Let’s leave it all to fate.”