“Awooo!” Mou Siming let out a mighty howl.
His body was bound in thick chains.
These were Chains of Earth, chains created with soil through the power of the Earth Dao, making them exceptionally tough.
And around him, numerous flames threatened to engulf him.
A single spark from these flames could turn the skies crimson for a thousand kilometers, but here, when gathered to burn a single person, they couldn’t even get close to him.
A faint white light circled around Mou Siming, preventing those flames from getting closer. Not only that, the white light was expanding, slowly pushing back the flames.
Even the Chains of Earth were beginning to creak.
This wasn’t because the power of Earth was not powerful enough. Normally, only another Great Dao power could effectively break them. But all Great Dao powers shared a common weakness: the person that used them.
Dao power was limitless, but humans were limited.
As for right now, Tang Jie wasn’t some master of the Earth Element, and he wasn’t even present, so he had limited ability to maintain the power, which gave Mou Siming the opportunity. If the two women nearby weren’t doing their utmost to maintain the power, he might have already escaped.
“Oh no! This guy is getting stronger and stronger. I’m about to reach my limit,” the Vermillion Bird said as she controlled the flames.
“Hold on a little longer. Tang Jie’s about to kill that bastard.” Xu Miaoran had the crystal ball which let her see what was going on outside. At this moment, she was constantly forming hand signs to maintain the cage.
Mou Siming growled, “You two silly girls dare to oppose me? Once I get out of here, I’ll kill you all!”
Energy erupted from his body, pushing back the cage of earth and flames some more.
Seeing this, Xu Miaoran clenched her teeth and took out a small blue bottle. She tipped a pill out and swallowed it down, upon which her body instantly began to radiate an immense energy.
“This is…” Mou Siming was stunned. “The Astral Origin Spirit Pill?”
The Astral Origin Spirit Spill was a combat pill that gave one’s cultivation a huge temporary boost. It was extremely valuable in battle, but it was also extremely difficult to refine, requiring both numerous high-class materials and an excellent pill refiner.
Mou Siming was momentarily dumbfounded at the fact that Xu Miaoran would have such a pill.
Xu Miaoran had made it herself.
Thanks to the inter-domain trade, over the last several hundred years, Xu Miaoran’s pill refining capabilities had rapidly progressed, and she had long ago become the top pill master of the Rosecloud Domain. Even in the Vast Wilderness Continent, there were few who could compete with her skill.
Although the Martial Lord’s hidden realm had been destroyed, the Yellow Court World had replaced it. While several hundred years had passed on the outside, through the formation, this had been turned into several thousand years, giving her access to many thousand-year spirit plants. This included some spirit plants that had been moved over from the Martial Lord’s hidden realm.
With both the appropriate skill and resources, Xu Miaoran began to finally reveal her power as a pill master, refining all kinds of rare medicines, one of them being this Astral Origin Spirit Pill. But even with her resources, Xu Miaoran had only been able to refine three, and she had given one each to Tang Jie and Yiyi.
Xu Miaoran was at Deification, and after taking this medicine, her strength rose all the way to the peak of Soul Projection. She and the Vermillion Bird, who was half-Immortal, were able to push Mou Siming back together.
Mou Siming furiously roared, “Trying to suppress this old man after taking only one pill? Naive! Break!!!”
With a roar, his body exploded with even more light that once more pushed back the cage.
“If one isn’t enough, I’ll take more!” Xu Miaoran harrumphed. Another bottle appeared in her hand, and she immediately downed the pill inside.
Through her normal pill refining, she had accumulated numerous medicines. Some were used for cultivation, and others were used for combat. Tang Jie normally didn’t like taking medicine for fighting, so she had kept them for herself. She normally didn’t use them, but when she did, she used them in vast quantities, letting someone fully experience how terrifying it could be when a top-class pill master went absolutely crazy.
Xu Miaoran’s body raged with terrifying energy that poured out to suppress Mou Siming, so much so that he was rendered immobile.
He cried out in fear, “Crazy woman! You’re crazy!”
Pills weren’t talismans. Eating so much could easily cause damage to oneself, with consequences ranging from energy corruption to death.
But Xu Miaoran ate them without any regard for the backlash, the medicinal power rampaging out of her body and forming a howling tsunami of energy. As the filter, Xu Miaoran was like a small dam, and the slightest mistake could cause the dam to collapse and her to die.
Yet Xu Miaoran stood strong. As a pill master, nobody understood this medicinal power more than she did. Swimming in that sea of energy, she never faltered, sending out wave after wave from her body to rush at Mou Siming.
In truth, Mou Siming was sharing the burden of power with her. If he gave up resistance, Xu Miaoran’s power would have nowhere to go, and her life would be in danger. However, he was unaware, unable, and unwilling to give up resistance. His instinct as an Immortal told him that he needed to break out of this cage to recover his dignity and rescue Jade Truth—Tang Jie was on the verge of reaching Godlike.
But Jade Truth also wasn’t that easy to deal with, with his own tricks and also his defensive pseudo–Dao armament. Although these things seemed unable to stop Tang Jie’s attack, in reality, Tang Jie needed to expend some effort each time.
Thus, Mou Siming couldn’t give up. As the three people struggled on and the medicinal power continued to rush out of Xu Miaoran’s body in the form of energy, not only did she not fall, her eyes grew brighter and brighter, and a special aura began to emerge in her body. Xu Miaoran’s cultivation level was visibly increasing.
Even the Vermillion Bird was startled. “You advanced?”
Xu Miaoran smiled. “Not yet, but the surge of medicinal power widened my meridians.”
Horizon Ocean Pavilion had been able to become one of the top sects of the Rosecloud Domain, so it had just as many secret arts and techniques as the Basking Moon Sect. One of its mantras was called The Sea and Sky as One. This was a special spell for guiding the flow, which Horizon Ocean Pavilion had given a pretty name. This spell art could guide spiritual energy to widen the spirit meridians, increasing the recovery speed and ease of use of spiritual energy. It sounded ordinary, but it was actually a formidable secret art. It was just that expanding the spirit meridians took far too much spiritual energy, and one needed at least three Violet Palace experts assisting on the side.
Xu Miaoran had reached the same result through sheer quantity of medicines, guiding the flood of energy to widen her meridians and sending the rest at her enemy to bear, wasting nothing.
As this was her first time doing this, Xu Miaoran hadn’t been sure it would actually work, but it appeared that her gamble had paid off.
If Tang Jie had known about this, he definitely wouldn’t have approved. However, Xu Miaoran had had enough of sitting on the sidelines while Tang Jie fought, and she was willing to take risks to grow stronger.
Meanwhile, Mou Siming had started to panic now that his counterattack had been pushed back.
He opened his mouth and spat out a small silver ring which flew at the cage.
“Starshatter Ring, destroy it!!!”