Immortals of the End Times

Chapter 43: With the help of a fox spirit, the cultivator was killed.

Under the moonlight, the bladed sword pellets swiftly swept across the sky.

Not long after, Zhao Wuji followed the white fox out of the imperial city, flew for more than ten miles, and finally arrived at Hanshan.

Despite flying such a great distance, he did not feel any weakening of his connection with his physical body, and his soul remained stable within the sword pellet.

Clearly, not only has his slightly improved Spirit Communication Technique become more powerful, but with the simultaneous improvement in his martial arts and immortal cultivation, his essence, energy, and spirit have also become much stronger, and his soul has also grown stronger.

He followed the white fox up the mountain and quickly sensed many auras on the mountain.

To the north of the mountain is Hanshan Temple. The monks in the temple exude a serene and pure aura, free from any clamor, and seem to possess a subtle spiritual wisdom.

However, most of them were not strong, and the two strongest auras were only at the level of a martial artist who had opened the meridians, belonging to the ranks of second-rate martial arts masters in this era.

In the mountain stream on the south side of the mountain, there was a mixture of various auras, lacking spirituality and appearing muddled and confused, out of place with human presence, similar to the situation I sensed last time.

But there was another aura among them, like a phoenix falling into a flock of crows. It possessed spirituality and a powerful aura, which, compared to the surrounding auras, was like the bright moon among fireflies.

However, its aura seemed to be rapidly losing its spirituality, giving it a sense of decline.

"This is probably the old fox's aura. He does indeed have some skill; he should be at the second level of Qi Refining, but his spirituality and energy are both dissipating, which feels similar to my state when I first broke through."

Zhao Wuji noticed the old fox's aura and clicked his tongue in amazement.

In this degenerate age, even those with exceptional talent find cultivation extremely difficult, requiring a great deal of resources, let alone wild beasts.

It's unbelievable that a fox could cultivate to the second level of Qi Refining in just over twenty years. It must either have exceptional talent in demonic cultivation or have had some amazing adventure.

He observed the white fox from afar as it disappeared into its den in the mountain stream, its aura mingling with the surrounding air, without following closely behind.

After that, he circled the mountain stream for a while and found it to be nothing special, but his ghostly eyes vaguely saw that there seemed to be a special spiritual creature inside the fox den, which attracted his soul.

"Could that be the old fox's extraordinary encounter?"

Zhao Wuji seemed to be deep in thought. Seeing that the old fox's aura was constantly dissipating, which did not seem fake, he believed the white fox's story.

Cultivation and spiritual attainment are hard-won, and one's own spirituality needs to be protected and strengthened. Neither human nor demon cultivators would joke about losing their cultivation and spirituality.

"Let's wait three days and see. Cooperating with a demon is not something to rush into, and it will give us more control. We can then see what sincerity this fox spirit really has."

Just as Zhao Wuji was about to ride the sword pellet back to the imperial city, his spiritual senses suddenly detected a strange and faint fluctuation of spiritual energy emanating from the nearby woods, seemingly observing him from the shadows.

"Who?! Why is there a fluctuation of spiritual energy here? Is this a trap?"

He immediately became alert and, without making a sound, manipulated the sword pellet to stealth away.

As it circled around the woods, the sword suddenly accelerated, taking the initiative and darting into the forest.

A figure inside the woods was already on high alert.

Seeing that the sword ball suddenly accelerated and rushed into the forest, the man immediately bowed down and knelt down to beg for mercy.

"Senior, spare me! Senior, spare me! It was all a misunderstanding. I was just curious and that's why I followed you here to investigate!"

Zhao Wuji was taken aback, and the sword pellet he was about to use to strike the opponent began to spin in mid-air.

I've never encountered someone kneel down and beg for mercy before the fight even started, especially not a very old man.

Just as he was hesitating, he suddenly felt a faint fluctuation of spiritual energy being released.

"Beware!"

At that moment, a loud, aged shout suddenly rang out, accompanied by a chilling and ferocious aura.

A sense of foreboding surged through Zhao Wuji's mind, and he almost instinctively urged the sword pellets to retreat and disperse.

"Keng!"

The bladed sword pellets opened and closed with a snap, scattering countless silver rays in all directions. The core iron ball protecting the Yin Wind Divine Soul retreated rapidly under the cover of the blades.

In the blink of an eye, the kneeling man suddenly launched an attack!

"call out--"

A crimson light shot out from his sleeve.

Wherever it passed, more than ten blades shattered like thin ice.

Zhao Wuji felt a slight jolt in his soul from the cold wind, and the blood-red light barely grazed the iron ball!

"boom!"

Almost simultaneously, a gigantic claw, accompanied by a demonic wind, slammed down from mid-air. The man screamed in agony as half his shoulder instantly turned into a bloody mist. "You old bastard, you tricked me? You're asking for death!"

Zhao Wuji's killing intent surged, and the sword pellets and broken blades suddenly converged, transforming into a silver hurricane, like a high-speed spinning and cutting silver ribbon, shooting across the old man's body on the ground.

The old man's body trembled violently, and blood burst forth.

He roared, his spiritual energy surging, his spiritual power formidable, and he was about to unleash it by forming a hand seal.

The sword pellet, like a dragon's tail, shot out and struck the back of his head in an instant.

Click!

The skull shattered, and the sword pellet suddenly opened and exploded.

"Puff puff puff!—"

Large swathes of blood stained the ground as cold blades shot out in all directions.

The old man let out a miserable groan, his entire head burst open like a pear tree blossoming, dozens of bloody holes bursting open. His body 'plop' fell to the ground, twitching slightly, blood gushing out.

In the blink of an eye, the battle was over.

Whoosh! —

Zhao Wuji's bladed sword pellets closed in mid-air, but half of them had already cracked and were damaged.

He hovered in mid-air, and the ghostly eye within the sword pellet suddenly looked towards the hill sixty feet away.

There stood a hunched figure, his gray-brown Taoist robe wrinkled like tree bark, a crooked peach wood cane supporting his thin body.

It turned out to be an old fox, which stood upright, revealing two furry hind paws under its Taoist robe. It looked quite comical, and at that moment it was bowing to him and speaking in human language.

"Old Fox's Taoist name is Fox Mountain Master. He is a fellow Daoist cultivator from the mountains and wilderness who came from the Sword Pill Sect. He must be the person that Lady Zhang mentioned."

The old fox just now noticed someone spying on him, so he came out to observe, but he meant no harm.

As the old fox spoke, he waved his cane, and the giant claw artifact that had shattered half of the stranger's body in the forest flashed with spiritual light and flew up, wobbling, back to his side.

"Judging from his clothes, this person is probably a gray-robed cultivator from the Linglang Cave Heaven. Fortunately, he is only a low-level cultivator, otherwise you and I would be in big trouble."

The old fox did not approach, but pointed at the man in the forest from a distance and said, "Fellow Daoist, your true form has not yet arrived. If you trust me, then I will properly handle this man's body to avoid causing trouble. I will wait for you to arrive in person to discuss important matters!"

"The lowest level of the Linglang Cave Heaven, a gray-robed cultivator?"

Zhao Wuji's heart stirred, and he roughly guessed that this Linglang Cave Heaven might be some kind of immortal cultivation force, which he had managed to stumble upon.

He could now see that the old fox meant no harm; otherwise, why would he have helped him?

However, he did not leave directly, but instead used his sword pellet to approach the gray-robed cultivator.

A wisp of ghostly soul flew out from the opponent's corpse and was directly drawn into the sword pellet by his powerful Yin Wind Divine Soul.

The old fox on the other side vaguely sensed something, but without the Ghost Eye, he couldn't see the details.

Thinking that the mysterious imperial physician was verifying the truth of its words, it immediately replied.

"Fellow Daoist, rest assured. I still need to seek cooperation with you, and I will never harm you."

"But your sword pellet seems to be made of ordinary iron. If it clashes with the magical artifacts and talismans of other cultivators, you will suffer a great loss."

Zhao Wuji absorbed the gray-robed cultivator's Yin soul and vaguely sensed that the other party had a talisman on his body, which was the item that had attacked him earlier.

However, given the current situation, he couldn't take it away, and he didn't want to cause trouble for such a small gain. On the other hand, the other party's body was rapidly losing spiritual energy.

He immediately manipulated the Yin-Yang Pearl to quickly draw away the lost spiritual energy. The sword pellet floated slightly for a moment before speeding away.

"This person is indeed cautious, secretly following Jade Fox to observe me. I am merely a cultivator from this Linglang Cave Heaven, so why would I follow this person here?"

The old fox stood on the hill, watching Zhao Wuji leave. Suddenly, a little white fox and a group of mixed-haired foxes came running in, squeaking.

The old fox shook his head and called out, "Children, go into the mountains and call some friends to come with me to clean up the body and leave no trace."

On the other side, Zhao Wuji quickly flew back to the official residence on the broken sword pellet.

The spiritual energy absorbed from the cultivator's body has been rapidly transformed into 24 strands of Yin and Yang energy, bringing the meager Yang energy to 417 strands.

"This person is a Qi Refining Stage 2 cultivator, but he only has 24 strands of spiritual energy left in his body. It seems there's something wrong with his condition."

As Zhao Wuji pondered, he also gleaned a wealth of memories about the Linglang Cave Heaven from the spirits of the deceased cultivators, which filled him with astonishment.
Today is Monday, which is quite important. I'll post one chapter at midnight and another one this morning. Please vote with your monthly tickets, thank you!

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(End of this chapter)