Chapter 443: Robbery and Looting

"Crossing the White Desert directly should be quick enough," she said. "But the Sand Specter clan has a powerful presence there. Sandworms, sand snakes, bone vultures, and other malevolent spirits and demons act as their eyes, constantly relaying information. If we travel at high speed, it will be difficult to conceal our tracks."

"Now, our only hope is that the Water Mink Immortal is in a hurry to reach Yuzhou and doesn't intend to deal with us."

Li Weiyi's physique and bone structure rapidly transformed, and in an instant, he took on a different appearance.

Yang Qingxi and Yang Qingchan both showed surprised expressions.

His current appearance closely resembled Qin Feng, the Eternal Realm grandmaster from Thundercloud Sect they had encountered at sea earlier.

"No wonder you kept observing Qin Feng earlier."

Yang Qingxi circled Li Weiyi, scrutinizing him up and down. "Playing along with this might scare the Water Mink Immortal. But the aura of an Eternal Realm grandmaster..."

Li Weiyi then released a wisp of an Eternal Realm grandmaster's aura.

Yang Qingxi and Yang Qingchan exchanged glances, bewildered as to how he managed it.

If he hadn't been carrying Yuer, and if his weapon and spirit energy fluctuations hadn't matched, they would have suspected that the Li Weiyi before them was an old master in disguise.

Li Weiyi dispelled his disguise art. "Consider this a last resort; we can't rely on it completely."

He took out his jade artifact boat, which expanded to over ten meters in length.

Propelled by Yang Qingchan, the jade boat glided swiftly over the sand, aiming to cross the desert at top speed.

Li Weiyi sat at the stern, first setting up a small concealment array. Then, within the array, he activated the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish to weave a Cocoon of Time.

He took out pieces of Spirit Altar Blazing Star Stone, preparing for his second attempt to break through to a Seven-Star Spirit Master.

Six-Star and Seven-Star levels might seem only one realm apart, but the difference in grand realm power is equivalent to nearly two minor realms.

As for the Ninth Heaven of Dao Seed Realm and the Eternal Realm, the gap in power is likely equivalent to three minor realms. Only Tang Wanzhou, the first person in the past thousand years in the Lingxiao Living Realm, could achieve a draw against an Eternal Realm cultivator while in the Ninth Heaven of Dao Seed Realm, and that was with the aid of an Eternal Body.

Inheritors, in the Dao Seed Realm, can challenge and defeat cultivators one minor realm higher.

A Young Heavenly Emperor can defeat cultivators two minor realms above them.

The difficulty of overcoming higher realms varies greatly depending on artifacts, Dao arts, physical body, state of mind, environment, spiritual energy, and realm progression, leading to significant uncertainty.

In short, as long as Li Weiyi breaks through to a Seven-Star Spirit Master, his combat power will significantly increase.

Light radiated from his spiritual realm between his eyebrows, and flames burned like a divine furnace.

A day later,

Blood seeped from his eyes, and cracks appeared on the skin between his eyebrows.

His spiritual realm seemed on the verge of exploding.

Li Weiyi was forced to stop his attempt to break through.

It was another failure, wasting seven pieces of Spirit Altar Blazing Star Stone.

"It seems I was too aggressive. Becoming a Seven-Star Spirit Master is indeed difficult."

It had been less than two months since he broke through to a Six-Star Spirit Master. Even with the accumulated time from the Cocoon of Time, it was still too short; he consistently fell just short.

Fortunately, he had obtained many Spirit Altar Blazing Star Stones from Yao Qingxuan's interdimensional bag, so he wasn't worried about consumption for now.

After his meditation, Li Weiyi pondered for a moment, then pulled out a beast-taming scroll and began to study it.

If breaking through realms wasn't an option, then he would study techniques.

For Spirit Masters dealing with demonic beasts, "Beast Script" was the most effective method. If the Beast Script was profound enough and skillfully applied, one could even tame some demonic beasts for their own use.

Days passed within the Cocoon of Time.

From time to time, massive bone vultures appeared in the sky, circling above the jade artifact boat.

Yang Qingchan concluded that the enemies were conducting reconnaissance.

Using the Thousand-Character Artifact Longbow he had seized from the Marquis of Divine Wings, Li Weiyi had shot down eight of them over several days. However, the number of bone vultures did not decrease; instead, their frequency of appearance increased.

Li Weiyi did not continue his cultivation within the Cocoon of Time.

He estimated that contact between the two sides would occur within the next day or half a day.

Either they would push through, or they would return directly to the Lingxiao Living Realm.

Li Weiyi retrieved a corpse from the internal space of the Evil Camel Bell.

The corpse was severely decayed, with flesh rotting away in many places, exposing golden bones.

It was the body of an Eternal Realm grandmaster.

While in Lingxiao City, Li Weiyi and Taishi Yu were ambushed by the Phoenix-Born Kirin-Young. This Eternal Realm corpse was one that had been collected into the Blood Mud Space after being killed by Tang Wanzhou during that ambush.

Li Weiyi had learned the method of awakening corpses by dripping blood from Chan Hai Guan Wu, but given his current blood energy strength, the awakened state could not be maintained indefinitely; it could only be used during combat.

Yang Qingxi sat at the stern, looked at Li Weiyi across from her, and asked with a smile, "Who exactly is she?"

Li Weiyi glanced at Yuer, who was squatting on the ground, drawing daily. His heart suddenly tightened, thinking Yang Qingxi had discovered her secret.

"You're nervous!" Yang Qingxi chuckled. "She can't be your daughter; after all, we met three years ago."

Yuer secretly perked up her ears.

"What is Young Lady Yang trying to say?" Li Weiyi asked.

"Given your character, logically, you would never bring a little girl into such danger. I'm very curious," Yang Qingxi said.

"Yuer is my disciple. We are both without parents; why can't we rely on each other?"

Li Weiyi immediately changed the subject. "After you took your forty-eight jin of immortal soil from the Underground Immortal Manor, Young Lady Yang, did you leave the main altar?"

Against the backdrop of the night, Yang Qingxi appeared serene and beautiful as she gazed at the vast desert glowing with a pale, ghostly light. "Are you asking why the methods you used in Lingxiao City, intended to bring down the Shui Sect, didn't kill me? Actually, Shui Sect's Sacred Spirit Master, the old ancestor of the Sheng family, died at the main altar because of your two blood letters."

So she knew everything.

"I had no other choice," Li Weiyi said.

"That's a bit contrived!"

Yang Qingxi smiled, using his own words back at him. She continued, "Everyone faces many unavoidable circumstances when serving their own masters. As long as our personal grievances are settled... I would very much like to be your confidante. Many times, I despise myself. Even though you beat me up, and even though I know we're using each other, my feelings are just so muddled and impossible to cut off."

"Let's stop there. Let's talk about your true confidante."

"Do you know who the master of the Heavenly Hall is?"

"Since you're asking, I presume it's that transcendent individual from the Jiang family," Li Weiyi replied.

Yang Qingxi nodded with a solemn expression. "After the great change in the Underground Immortal Manor, when the monk's remains revived, I met him, and he accepted me as his disciple."

"So that's how it is!"

Li Weiyi suddenly understood. "With your talent as an inheritor and your Dragon Seed Dao, it's certainly enough to become a disciple of a transcendent being."

"Then do you know who Jiang Ning is?" Yang Qingxi asked.

"I know her," Li Weiyi said. "She couldn't possibly know about the relationship between the Jiang family and the Dao Cult. She grew up in Luantai and utterly despises the Dao Cult."

Yang Qingxi gazed at him for a long moment before quietly saying, "The rice flowers that permeate several states of the Lingxiao Living Realm, enabling the cultivation of Yin Corpse Rice, overflow from the pavilion and hall within her mind."

"Two bodies, one origin; all rice shares a single root."

"I personally witnessed a group of old cultivators from the Dao Cult kneeling before her, hailing her as the Rice Mother."

Li Weiyi's eyes sharpened, and his heart was greatly shaken.

The secret of the pavilion and hall was not something Yang Qingxi could fabricate on a whim.

Yang Qingxi said, "I shouldn't have told you all this. But you also carry a great secret, and if you're not careful, you might suffer a great loss in the future."

"In Fuzhou, did you see Zuoqiu Hongting?" Li Weiyi asked, a new worry rising in his heart, fearing he might have harmed her.

Yang Qingxi gently shook her head.

The ground trembled, and sand began to jump.

Li Weiyi discarded all distracting thoughts, immediately hoisted Yuer onto his back, wrapping her in his cloak. He then took out a "Jie" character immobilizing talisman and handed it to Yang Qingxi, suggesting it could be used for a surprise attack at a crucial moment.

When he was a Five-Star Spirit Master, the "Jie" character immobilizing talismans he refined could briefly restrain experts like Xie Chucai.

Naturally, the "Jie" character immobilizing talismans he refined with his current spiritual power mastery were even more powerful.

He was also using this opportunity to test whether she could be trusted.

After all, in Li Weiyi's mind, Yang Qingxi was a woman who prioritized her own interests, and he always maintained a degree of caution.

"Something's not right! The demon race doesn't seem to be ambushing us; instead, they've already started fighting another force."

Li Weiyi put away the jade boat, concealed his aura, and swiftly flew towards the top of the sand dune.

He saw.

On the other side of the sand dune, a large chaotic battle involving malevolent spirits and demons was erupting.

"Lord Lan is dead," the Water Mink Immortal, draped in a red cloak and wielding a golden halberd with its small paw, proclaimed imperiously to the fighting Yin soldiers. "Now this territory belongs to our East Sea demon race. Leave the treasure you're escorting, and I, this immortal, guarantee I will let you go."

Centered around it, within a radius of several miles, large numbers of sand specters, sand snakes, and sand worms gathered, while hundreds of bone vultures circled in the sky.

Strong winds raged, sweeping up sand and dust.

Under siege was a contingent of Yin soldiers escorting a secret treasure.

The Yin soldiers were all clad in armor, bearing a large flag with the character "Lan," indicating they were Lord Lan's personal guard. Their bodies were formed from condensed blue soul fire, radiating a terrifying, bone-chilling aura.

At the forefront of the contingent was an Yin Ghost Commander riding a bone dragon.

The Yin Ghost Commander, a master of a profound realm, wielded an artifact battle saber, appearing awe-inspiring with sharp, piercing eyes. The bone dragon beneath him was over seventy meters long and roared incessantly.

On the bone dragon's back was a seven-story bone tower, from which low, resonant dragon roars continuously echoed.

"Indeed, order has collapsed throughout the Southeast Nether Realm, with conflicts and wars erupting everywhere."

Li Weiyi had originally planned to escape while the Water Mink Immortal was preoccupied with raiding, but when the dragon roars echoed from within the bone tower, the Dragon Seed Dao Lotus in his Wind Palace unexpectedly showed strange fluctuations.

Scriptures appeared on the Dao Lotus, exceptionally active.

"Do you feel that?" Li Weiyi whispered.

Yang Qingxi nodded. "The Dao Lotus is fluctuating intensely. Whatever is inside that bone tower must be of immense benefit to cultivators like us who cultivate the Dragon Seed Dao. What could it be?"

In the distance,

The Yin Ghost Commander, standing on the bone dragon's back, pointed his battle saber directly at the Water Mink Immortal. "Presumptuous! How dare a small river mink like you curse Lord Lan? Retreat at once! A great discovery has been made in the East Sea, and I must immediately return to Jinlan Plain to report it. What's in the bone tower is not something you can touch!"