In Shatter City...
In the middle of the night, Li Ye threw his head back and laughed uproariously in his room, holding a short, silver spear in his hand.
Everyone in a 50-meter radius was awoken from their cultivation, and they immediately cursed Li Ye for his neurotic behavior.
In a nearby s.p.a.cious stone room, Pei Qiqi was wholeheartedly engraving a detailed spiritual formation drawing onto a beautiful piece of jade when she was startled by Li Ye’s yell, making her finger shake.
CRUNCH!
The s.p.a.ce Spirit Jade in her hand cracked open.
Rage immediately appeared on Pei Qiqi’s delicate face as she dashed out of her room as lightly as a puff of air.
In about ten seconds, she appeared in front of Li Ye like a ghost. Without saying a word, she punched him in the face before he could react.
BOOM!
Li Ye’s body was immediately sent flying backwards before cras.h.i.+ng heavily onto the ground.
“What the h.e.l.l are you doing, senior martial sister?!” Li Ye sat up and asked bitterly, holding his swollen face in his hands.
“I wanted to ask you the same question!” Pei Qiqi said angrily.
“What? Did I disturb you?” With these words, Li Ye seemed to have come to some realization, and hastily forced a smile on his face, saying, “I finally finished the short, silver spear for Hu Han. I just ran a series of tests, and it’s proven to be a Premium grade spiritual tool. Hahaha!
“I’m a Premium grade equipment forger from now on!” Complacent with himself, Li Ye grew increasingly animated.
Pei Qiqi’s eyebrows furrowed as she said, “Hu Han? I told you to drive her away long ago. That woman has ulterior motives. Why don’t you listen to me?”
A forced smile could be seen on Li Ye’s face as he said, “I couldn’t. After all, she knows something about equipment forging, and can help me with my work. None of the other ones know a d.a.m.n thing about equipment forging, including Hua Tian. None of them are helpful, not in the slightest. Don’t tell me you want me to count on them.”
“Hua Tian...” Upon hearing Nie Tian’s name, Pei Qiqi suddenly realized that it had been awhile since she’d seen him. Therefore, she asked, “Is that guy still in the Blood Skull’s headquarters?”
“Nope, he went to the Void Illusion Mountain Range,” Li Ye said.
Pei Qiqi’s expression flickered slightly. “The Void Illusion Mountain Range?! How did he get there?”
“Via the teleportation portal you set up in the Void Illusion Mountain Range.” Li Ye chuckled, as if he was quite proud of his intelligence. “He’s Mr. Hua’s nephew, and Mr. Hua personally brought him here. That makes him one of us. Hey, by the way, have you noticed that every time our master talks about Mr. Hua, her expression changes? I bet he and our master...”
Pei Qiqi gave Li Ye a cold look as she blurted, “The fact that Mr. Hua personally put him in our hands is exactly the reason why we should guarantee his safety! I can’t believe you actually let him go to the Void Illusion Mountain Range by himself! Are you aware that he’s only at the Lesser Heaven stage, and letting him roam about in the Void Illusion Mountain Range by himself will get him killed?
“Do you really think he can single-handedly defeat a powerful expert like Yang Ling in the Void Illusion Mountain Range?
“You moron!”
Pei Qiqi’s scolding made Li Ye cower. He laughed embarra.s.sedly and said, “I know that, and that’s why I arranged for Hu Han to go with him. Also, I forced Hu Han to take a Heart Crus.h.i.+ng Pill before departing. Rest a.s.sured, considering her status, she won’t be able to get an antidote on her own. She’ll play by the rules and take care of Nie Tian for me.”
“What?!” Pei Qiqi seemed astounded as she stared at Li Ye as if she were staring at a fool. “You let Hu Han go with him?! Haven’t you ever suspected why she’s been working for you?”
“What do you mean?” Li Ye was puzzled.
Pei Qiqi didn’t answer. Instead, she asked with a heavy tone, “How long have they been gone?”
“About ten days.” At this point, Li Ye also had the feeling that something bad might be going on. He put away his smiles and asked, with all seriousness, “What do you know, senior martial sister?”
“Ten days... I hope it’s not too late...” Pei Qiqi muttered before striding out of Li Ye’s room.
When she disappeared from Li Ye’s confused gaze, her voice echoed out, “You stay here, and don’t you dare leave Shatter City before I come back! We’ll talk then!”
At the same time, a wave of mysterious spatial energy spread out.
After a short while, she appeared by the inter-spatial teleportation portal in the central square. She told Liu Kang that she needed to use the portal immediately.
Without any hesitation, Liu Kang made the arrangements for her.
SHEW!
In the next moment, Pei Qiqi showed up in the small teleportation portal she had set up in the Void Illusion Mountain Range.
She rapidly glanced around, and the let out a sigh of relief after being convinced that nothing had happened to it.
Then, she reached out and placed her hand on the portal as she cast a spell in her mind.
The portal rapidly shrank to the size of a palm, and she put it away effortlessly.
Afterwards, she stepped out of the cave and marched quickly among the slithering spatial rifts.
She s.h.i.+fted skillfully among the spatial rifts as she rapidly closed in on the location that Li Ye had pointed out for her.
Meanwhile, Ma Jiu, along with a handful of his subordinates, were marching towards Pei Qiqi’s teleportation portal according to the directions Hu Han had provided.
Ma Jiu’s sharp eyes caught sight of Pei Qiqi, who was s.h.i.+fting among the spatial rifts under the chilly moonlight. “Miss Pei.”
Pei Qiqi’s expression flickered slightly. “Ma Jiu!”
Ma Jiu seemed as if he had just discovered an unexpected prize. “Wow, I didn’t expect to run into you here. This is good!” He raised his left hand and called out to his men, “Go get her, dead or alive!”
Upon hearing his order, the Dark Moon Qi warriors airily spread out to surround Pei Qiqi.
Seeing that some of the most powerful Dark Moon experts had shown up in this place, Pei Qiqi instantly came to realize that Hu Han must had revealed the location of her teleportation portal to them. This was no coincidence that had they showed up here at the same time.
As the commander of the Dark Moon’s base in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, Ma Jiu was at the late Greater Heaven stage. Among the men he had brought, two were at the Greater Heaven stage. Only the three of them were more than enough to kill Pei Qiqi in an open s.p.a.ce.
However, fortunately for her, they were in the Void Illusion Mountain Range.
“Oh yeah? Come and get me then!” With those words, Pei Qiqi flashed to a location where numerous spatial rifts were swimming about. She constantly s.h.i.+fted her position to avoid contact with them.
Not daring to enter the area, Ma Jiu and the other powerful Dark Moon experts could only watch her from afar.
In another corner of the mountain range...
Nie Tian rose to his feet after detecting a fight going on not far from him.
He mixed his psychic awareness with power from the fragmentary stars in his mind, and formed six other Heaven Eyes.
With seven Heaven Eyes in the sky, he instantly gained a clear grasp of everything that was going on in the vicinity.
Just as he was about to move out, Hu Han’s voice rang out from within the Sound Stone in his waist pocket. “Are you still there, Hua Tian?”
“Amazing timing,” Nie Tian thought to himself as he took out the Sound Stone and responded, “I am, but I just detected a battle going on nearby. I’m going to see what’s going on.”
“No! Don’t! Stay where you are and wait for me!” Hu Han sounded anxious. “Considering your cultivation base, you’d better stay out of battles of all sorts! You can’t possibly change anything with your current strength. Plus, if you get yourself killed, I’ll suffer from it as well.”
Nie Tian could feel that Hu Han was probably panting because she was hastening to his position.
Harboring suspicion in his mind, Nie Tian put the Sound Stone away and followed his Heaven Eyes’ guide to the location where a fierce battle was taking place.
Before he showed up, his seven Heaven Eyes had already obtained a thorough grasp of the battle.
The battle was between two sides. Some were wearing Blood Skull garments, and their leader was a man in his late twenties. The man seemed to be at the late Heaven stage, which was higher than any of his men.
He was wearing pitch-black gloves, which were covered in what seemed to be fangs. At first glance, his hands looked like the opened mouths of two beasts.
At that moment, he was swinging his fist, single-handedly fighting two experts with the same cultivation base as him.
On the other side of the battlefield, two Heaven stage Blood Skull members were standing back to back, defending against five early Heaven stage attackers. One of them was wielding a long, black spear and the other was holding a wide sword.
There were seven people attacking the Blood Skull members. Since they were dressed differently, they seemed to belong to different organizations.
Each and every one of them emanated a strong killing intent and had bloodthirsty looks in their eyes, as if they were going to skin and devour the three Blood Skull members alive.
A late Heaven stage expert grinned sinisterly and called out, “My brothers, Cai Yuan here is the son of the head of the Blood Skull! If we can capture him alive, we’ll be able to demand tons of spirit stones and spiritual tools from the Blood Skull! Those Blood Skull b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have organized numerous operations against us and killed lots of our brothers. We’ve finally found an opportunity to even things up today!
“The spirit stones and spiritual materials we’ll get from the Blood Skull will enable us to live the rest of our lives extravagantly in Ash City or even the Land of the Abandoned!”
The seven of them cheered each other up, “Let’s do this!” “Don’t let him get away!”
They madly summoned their spiritual power and brandished their spiritual tools as they bombarded the three Blood Skull members.
“Cai Yuan!” After getting a clear view of all this with his Heaven Eyes, Nie Tian was surprised.
Li Ye had mentioned Cai Yuan’s name when he had told him about Cai Yue, the daughter of the Blood Skull’s leader, while waiting outside of the cultivation rooms.
According to Li Ye, the head of the Blood Skull had two children, Cai Yue for a daughter, and Cai Yuan for a son.
Li Ye had also said that Cai Yuan spent most of his time in the Void Illusion Mountain Range instead of Shatter City, tempering his strength and battle prowess through b.l.o.o.d.y battles.
As a matter of fact, he wasn’t highly regarded only because of his background. Rather, he had won the respect of the members of the Blood Skull and powerful experts from other forces by shedding blood with his men in countless battles.
“Don’t you even imagine that you can capture our young lord with just the seven of you!” With these words, the man with the wide sword threw his head back and let out a roar. His sword made the sounds of wind and thunder as he swung it, creating numerous bolts of lightning.
CRACKLE! BOOM!
In the next moment, one of his opponents was engulfed by lightning as he trudged backwards with dark smoke rising from him.
PUFF!
At that moment, however, another of his opponents drove an awl-shaped spiritual tool through his leather armor and into his abdomen, leaving a sizable b.l.o.o.d.y hole.
“Go, little lord! Don’t mind us!” Suffering from the extreme pain, the man brandished his wide sword, sending out numerous lightning bolts as he charged towards the two Heaven stage experts who were attacking Cai Yuan. He wished to distract them so that Cai Yuan might be able to find an opportunity to escape.
“Get back to your own opponents!” Cai Yuan gave an angry shout. “I don’t need you to rescue me!”
At that moment, Nie Tian finally arrived at the battlefield. With a strange expression on his face, he glanced back and forth before saying, “I’m from Shatter City. If you’re willing to pay me in spirit stones, I’ll be happy to kill these people for you. One thousand spirit stones for one kill, but I’ll only take on those with early Heaven cultivation bases or lower.”