Panicked, Fei Li was running for his life in a forest of ancient trees.
When the catastrophe hit the Spiritual Treasure sect, he hadn’t been in the valley. Instead, he had been instructed by his master Gan Kang to go and run some errands.
Originally, he planned to return to the sect on the third day of the Treasure Convention, when the auction was scheduled to start.
However, when he returned, he saw that the moon in the sky was reddened by blood from afar.
Shortly thereafter, he heard the heaven-shaking, earth-shattering sounds of combat coming from the valley.
Then, he saw the Heaven Burning Earth Flame formation that had been shielding the valley be torn apart, and grand elder Fang Hui rise into the sky on his enormous bronze cauldron.
In that moment, he understood that his chances of survival would be slim if he dared to return to the mountain valley.
Secretly glad that he wasn’t there when it happened, he decided to abandon the sect, and get as far away as possible from the valley.
As for the life and death of his master Gan Kang, the Spiritual Treasure sect, as well as his martial brothers and sisters, he had already cast all of them out of his head.
“Fei Li, where are you going?” A fiery, beautiful woman suddenly emerged from behind a tree, coldly staring at him, her eyes full of ridicule and disdain.
It was An Shiyi.
An Shiyi, who was at the late Heaven stage, stood in front of Fei Li, blocking his way forward. A flaming intent to fight could be seen in her charming eyes. A bunch of orange, cloud-like flames floated out from within her and wreathed around her curvy body.
She took out a mysterious ribbon that was glittering with colorful light from her waist. With a swift waving motion, terrifying flames instantly shot out from the ribbon.
Fire had been her cultivation attribute since a very young age. Although An Shiyi had been cultivating with the Spiritual school, she had often dreamed of winning the favor of equipment forging masters of the Treasure school, and becoming a powerful equipment forger some day.
She had once foolishly believed that Gan Kang had valued her for her talent. It wasn’t until recently that she came to the realization that the only thing that he saw in her was her appearance, not her talent in equipment forging and refining.
Fei Li’s expression slightly flickered. “It’s you?!”
He looked around suspiciously, unsure of why An Shiyi had suddenly appeared.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH! WHOOSH!
It was also at that moment that Nie Tian, Pan Tao, Jiang Lingzhu, and the others caught up and arrived beside An Shiyi.
Fei Li grew even more astonished and confused. “How did you all get out?”
“Cut the crap!” An Shiyi’s tone wasn’t pleasant at all. She extended her hand towards Fei Yi and with a firm tone, she said, “Hand over the Spiritfount Pill, then you are free to go. I won’t stop you. If you refuse, then don’t blame me for not being polite.”
“An Shiyi! You dare to demand the Spiritfount Pill from me?!” Fei Li burst into a flaming rage. Obviously, he didn’t have a fully understanding of the situation. “Your clan is only a subordinate clan of the Spiritual Treasure sect! You dare to run away when the sect is in danger? Even your clan won’t be able to protect you from the punishment! My master is the fifth highest ranked equipment forging expert in the Treasure school. Where did you get the nerve to demand the Spiritfount Pill from me?”
“If Gan Kang wasn’t your master, I would’ve long since beaten you until every single one of your teeth fell out!” Old grudges and new enmities against him surged forth, filling An Shiyi’s heart. She couldn’t waste another second arguing with him. She immediately made a move.
The mysterious ribbon in her hands was like a swaying rainbow of flames that instantly whipped towards Fei Li.
WHOOKSH!
Fei Li hadn’t remained on guard, so the ribbon violently whipped him on his skinny cheek.
Not only was half of his face instantly swollen, it was even badly burned.
Fei Li covered his cheek as he screeched. “Bitch! You dare to attack me?!” He had never thought that An Shiyi, who had always been compromising, would actually make such a violent move against him.
Pan Tao furrowed his brows. Not wishing to waste any more time on Fei Li, he explained, “Elder Gan Kang has come to an agreement with several foreigners from the Realm of Dark Underworld. He’s decided to leave the Spiritual Treasure sect and even the Realm of Flame Heaven, and follow those foreigners to the Realm of Dark Underworld.
“He’s gone, and so is your backer in the Spiritual Treasure sect. As his disciple, you won’t be able to talk your way out of your responsibilities after your master defects.
“Hand over the Spiritfount Pill, and run as far as you can. I’d say go find your master and follow him to the Realm of Dark Underworld.”
Pan Tao knew that An Shiyi’s hate towards Fei Li was extremely deep, and also knew that An Shiyi was actually quite fierce, in distinct contrast to her gentle appearance.
Now that she had the chance to retaliate, she would naturally take the opportunity to make Fei Li suffer, so much so that she might even inflict serious damage on him.
Although Fei Li wasn’t much of a fighter, he was also at Heaven stage. Once the two got into a battle, it would definitely waste everyone’s time.
The reason why Pan Tao explained the situation to him was to let him have a clear understanding of the situation he was in and not fight An Shiyi to the death.
Fei Li was flabbergasted. His eyes flickered, as he seemed to have believed them. “My master… is going to the Realm of Dark Underworld? Here, take the Spiritfount Pill.”
Fei Li was surprisingly decisive. As soon as he understood the situation, he took out the case containing the Spiritfount Pill from his bracelet of holding and threw it towards Pan Tao without the slightest hesitation.
Pan Tao, who caught the case, lifted its cover and took a sniff, before tossing it to An Shiyi.
An Shiyi took a close look at it, and gently nodded. “It is the Spiritfount Pill.”
Upon hearing her confirmation, Nie Tian’s heart was immediately filled with joy.
The Spiritfount Pill was extremely rare in the Realm of Flame Heaven. In his opinion, this pill, which could cure the injury that had troubled his grandfather for many years, was even more precious than the Flame Dragon Armor.
“Can I go now?” Fei Li asked.
An Shiyi waved her hand. “Go, get out of here! Now that you don’t have Gan Kang to back you, don’t let me see you again in the Realm of Flame Heaven. If I do…”
Without waiting for her to finish speaking, Fei Li coldly snorted before turning and leaving.
“Here, your Spiritfount Pill.” An Shiyi threw it over to Nie Tian.
Nie Tian caught the case, and didn’t even cast a glance at it, but went ahead and stored it in his bracelet of holding. Smiling, he said, “Thanks, sister.”
With a sweet smile, An Shiyi said, “I finally helped you fulfill a wish.”
She had always been apologetic towards Nie Tian, knowing that because of her, he had offended Gan Kang. Otherwise, the Spiritfount Pill would’ve already been in Nie Tian’s hands.
Not long ago, she and her sister An Ying had given up all hope and waited for death in that courtyard. However, it was also Nie Tian who had come to their rescue. He was even willing to compromise his own chance of survival, just so that she and her sister could leave together with them.
She also knew that the reason why Wu Xing had been willing to speak out and take on the sisters as his responsibility, was that he had given face to Nie Tian, not wishing Nie Tian to waste his time persuading them.
It was also because of her that Gan Kang had blocked up the stone tunnel and denied entrance for everyone, preventing them from escaping at the first possible moment.
She knew that she owed Nie Tian too much, and thus was always on the lookout for opportunities to repay him.
Now that she had helped him obtain the Spiritfount Pill, which should have been his from the start, she finally felt a bit relieved and the smile on her face became lighter and brighter.
“Hey, we aren’t safe yet.” Pan Tao smiled bitterly. “Whatever you need to say, can you say it when we are far away from the valley and out of the range of the Ghost sect and Blood sect’s hunting?”
“You’re right.” An Shiyi pursed her mouth into a smile.
“Okay, lead the way please,” Nie Tian said.
…
At the exit where Nie Tian and the others had escaped from, many experts from the Blood sect were fighting fiercely with people from the Spiritual school, Treasure school, as well as Wu Xing and Dowager Weng.
All of a sudden, Yu Tong from the Blood sect ran out of the center of the valley and arrived in front of them.
“Martial Uncle Yang Yuan, did you see some Cloudsoaring sect juniors leave?” she inquired the one-armed expert from the Blood sect who was currently fighting with Wu Xing.
Yang Yuan answered without thinking, “Oh, those juniors were pretty lucky. They were the first ones to escape through here.”
Yu Tong, who was wearing a blood-red long dress, hurriedly asked, “Do you know who they were? What cultivation stage were they at?”
The expert from the Blood sect, who had previously fought with Lai Yi, was about to enter the stone cave to pursue the escaping Gan Kang and Lai Yi. After hearing Yu Tong’s words, he paused and said, “The leader was that An Shiyi from the Spiritual school, at the late Heaven stage. The others were all juniors who are only at the early Lesser Heaven stage.”
“Uncle Feng, can you come with me?” Yu Tong pleaded.
An expert from the Blood sect who had been following her nodded and sneered. “What I love the most is catching the mice that think that they’ve escaped.”
A bloody light flashed across in Yu Tong’s eyes. “I’ve asked around and confirmed that the disciple that Eccentric Wu has just taken in also came here, and he should be among those juniors!”
Yang Yuan was surprised. “The same Nie Tian that you’ve been talking about for the past half year?”
“Exactly!” A heaven-shaking killing intent could be heard from Yu Tong’s words.
Yang Yuan nodded and turned to the Blood sect expert behind Yu Tong. “Feng Luo, that Nie Tian kid is Little Tong’s mental devil which has been dragging her cultivation down. Go help her clear her mind.”
“Got it.” Feng Luo let out a cunning laugh.
The experts from the Blood sect knew that Yu Tong had been severely injured and was unconscious when she returned from the Green Illusion dimension. She had spent a long time in recovery.
After recovering, Yu Tong had practiced even harder, and was now stronger than ever.
However, it seemed that she couldn’t forget about a youngster called Nie Tian, and asked everywhere for his whereabouts. It wasn’t until hearing that he had been accepted as a disciple to Wu Ji, did she give up on the idea of going to Black Cloud City and killing Nie Tian.
They could all see that, if Nie Tian didn’t die, he would eventually become a mental barrier on Yu Tong’s cultivation path. Therefore, they all supported her decision to kill him here.
“Let’s go, Uncle Feng!” Yu Tong and Feng Luo ran past the people who were fighting at the exit, and bolted after Nie Tian and the others.