My best friend asked me if I was still doing system tasks.

Luo Hanying sat cross-legged on the dry, withered grass, placing a stone slab between her knees. She used her divine sense to observe the movement of spiritual energy within the operating array.

She gestured with her fingers, calculating the possible location of the array's core. As time passed, her face grew paler and paler.

Ruan Chayan was engrossed in searching for anything else strange and didn't notice Luo Hanying's condition for a moment. But when she turned her head, she saw Luo Hanying hugging the stone slab and spitting out a mouthful of blood.

"Xiaoxue! What happened to you?!" Ruan Chayan anxiously helped Luo Hanying, who was sitting unsteadily in pain. "What kind of medicine do you need? Where are you injured?"

She took out Qi-Nourishing Pills, Rejuvenating Pills, and other items from her Qiankun Bag and placed them beside Luo Hanying for her to choose from.

Luo Hanying swallowed two Qi-Nourishing Pills, and then took out a Tranquilizing Pill from her storage ring and ate it.

Deducing formations and drawing talismans are both mentally and physically exhausting, so these cultivators always keep such pills on hand.

Luo Hanying and Ruan Chayan leaned against each other, looking down at the dripping blood, their mood was very bad: "I'm not seriously injured, I was just too eager to break the formation and was misled by the fake formation eye."

"I'll be fine after a short rest. My consciousness was damaged when I was controlled by Le Shu, and I have some hidden ailments, which is why they flared up so badly."

She wiped the blood from her nose, circulated her spiritual energy to stop it, and then said, "I'm having trouble breaking this formation. I'll try again after I've rested for a while."

Ruan Chayan dampened a handkerchief and helped Luo Hanying wipe the dirt off her face and hands, comforting her, "It's alright, it's alright. Since you're not feeling well, just rest. I'll call Jin Si out and ask him. Maybe he can help."

Don't push yourself too hard; your health is more important.

A flash of light appeared before Luo Hanying's eyes, and Jin Si's figure materialized out of thin air. He grumbled and complained, "I already told you I didn't want to come out! I find this godforsaken place unbearable; the chaotic spiritual energy here is suffocating! Why did you have to drag me out?!"

Ruan Chayan knew Jin Si's temperament, so she deliberately said in a somewhat ingratiating tone, "Jin Si, you are knowledgeable and experienced. Xiao Xue and I are facing a problem that we can't solve, so we naturally thought of you."

Take a look at the formation on this stone slab. Can you break it?

Jin Si glared angrily at Ruan Chayan: "Oh, you guys only think of me when you have good things to do, but you wake me up to do your work when there's trouble, huh?"

"We haven't encountered any good things yet, have we? Since we started dating, when have I ever failed to meet your needs?"

Ruan Chayan feigned weakness and hinted, "You wouldn't be unwilling to help us two juniors, would you?"

You are the renowned and ferocious beast, the Fiery-Eyed Golden Lion; who doesn't know your formidable reputation? This is a trivial matter that you could resolve with a flick of your finger. Please, have pity on us.

Jin Si scoffed: "A lifetime of illustrious reputation? What illustrious reputation do I have? It's good enough if everyone doesn't want to kill me."

Stop showing off your little schemes. I know what you're thinking.

"You can't even flatter me, yet you expect me to do your work? I must have killed too few people in my past life to have formed a pact with you."

Ruan Chayan & Luo Hanying: "..."

Luo Hanying spoke with difficulty: "...Your Jin Si has a rather strange temper. How come he's even more spoiled than Sichuan peppercorn?"

Ruan Chayan sighed helplessly: "This ancestor is capricious and stubborn. I really can't go against him or agree with him. If you speak to him nicely, he might listen to a little. You'll get used to it."

As Ruan Chayan said, although Jin Si was impatient, he did not make things too difficult for the two of them. After venting his anger, he waved his hand, and the blood-stained stone slab flew into his hand.

Jin Si flicked the stone slab with disdain and cast a dust-removing spell: "Oh dear, Luo Hanying, you're badly injured. There's so much blood."

Luo Hanying rolled her eyes, clutching her chest where the pain was gradually subsiding. "Stop talking nonsense. Whether my injury is minor or serious, I'm fine now. Don't make Tea Mama worry about me. Quickly take a look at the formation on this stone slab to see what it is."

Ruan Chayan offered Luo Hanying a few more words of concern and shared some of the pills she had with her.

Luo Hanying was both amused and exasperated: "I'm really fine now. If you give me all the pills, what will you eat if you get injured in the future?"

Ruan Chayan shamelessly said, "Don't I still have Jin Si? Although I don't know if Jin Si's pills have expired, the things he has are still good even if they have expired."

Upon hearing Ruan Chayan's words, Jin Si chuckled twice without refuting them. Instead, he opened his mouth and exhaled a cloud of white smoke, turning the stone slab into a handful of mud and sand in his hand.

Luo Hanying stared in disbelief: "You, you, you! This, this, this! This actually works?!"

"I don't know what kind of formation this is, and I can't find the core of the formation, but it's not impossible to destroy it directly."

Jin Si clapped his hands, shaking the sand off his palms. "You only asked me to break the formation, but haven't I already broken it?"

Before Jin Si finished speaking, everyone felt the mountains and forests tremble, birds flew up in alarm, and the spring of Changshui gushed out a jet of water before calming down.

Ruan Chayan cautiously observed her surroundings: "What's going on?"

Luo Hanying stood up and turned her head to see the collapsed statue: "It looks like an earthquake. Could there be aftershocks? Should we find somewhere else to stay?"

Jin Si shook his head solemnly: "No, this place is very strange. I just felt that this place was imprisoned by a force."

Tell me quickly what you need to know.

Ruan Luo and Ruan Chayan exchanged a glance, and Ruan Chayan then explained that they knew there was a Five Elements Spirit here. They knew that the Five Elements Spirit had a problem, otherwise the Changshui River would not have dried up. Their purpose in coming here was to save the Five Elements Spirit of the Changshui River.

"Five Elements Spirits?!" Jin Si's eyes lit up. "This godforsaken place has such spirits?"

As soon as Jin Si stuck out his butt, Ruan Chayan knew what he was about to say. She immediately turned cold and said, "Don't even think about it!"

The Five Elements Essence is the foundation upon which the Changshui River can bestow blessings upon all people. Unless I am dead, you are not to be trifled with it.

Jin Si could see that Ruan Chayan was serious. Knowing that the Five Elements Essence and the Qiongling Bone were different, she would never give in. So he said half-jokingly, "I didn't say I wanted to eat it. Can't I just take a couple of sips?"

Besides, we haven't even seen the Five Elements Essence yet, have we?

Luo Hanying understood the unspoken meaning in their words. She said incredulously, "Brother, why don't you eat something normal? They're all spirits of the Five Elements, they should be conscious, right? What you're doing is no different from cannibalism."

"I'd eat a human if I wanted to, so what's an elf?"

Seeing Ruan Chayan's cold expression, Jin Si changed his words and said, "Of course, the Five Elements Spirit is born to be the darling of the Heavenly Dao. Unlike a ferocious beast like me, even if I really wanted to take action against it, I would have to consider the consequences."

Ruan Chayan felt like a kindergarten teacher, with none of the children under her care being well-behaved.

She rubbed her temples and said, "Jin Si, didn't you say you felt a power imprisoning this place? Let's find the source together."