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

The drunken monk shouted, "Ruan Chayan, watch out!" He lunged forward and narrowly deflected the attack aimed at Ruan Chayan with a palm strike, but his arm ruptured and bled profusely, and his entire right arm hung limply down.

At the same time, Widow Qiao screamed and was sent flying by two cultivators at the Great Perfection of the Nascent Soul Realm. The magic weapon in her hand was already broken.

Ruan Chayan pulled the drunken monk aside with one hand, and with the other, she twirled her sword and forcefully pulled back the flying whisk: "Go help Widow Qiao! It's alright if I get hurt!"

The cultivator who had flung out his whisk used the force of the blow to swung it back hard: "Junior sister, hurry and save our two senior brothers!"

Ruan Chayan used a flipping motion to deflect the force of the projectiles. Three darts flew towards her from the opposite side. With her other hand, she summoned an array plate in front of her to activate the defensive array. After three crisp sounds, cracks appeared on the array, demonstrating the power of the darts.

Ruan Chayan's eyes widened: "You Taibai Pavilion really do love to play dirty tricks!"

The man opposite retracted his whisk and unleashed another attack: "To achieve one's goal, one will stop at nothing, regardless of whether it's a dirty trick or not!"

Ruan Chayan's lips curled into a strange smile: "You said it yourself."

She parried three moves from her opponent, then threw out three talismans. The cultivator's attention was focused on the talismans, and he hurriedly waved his whisk to destroy them.

Ruan Chayan seized the opportunity to unleash a spell: "Flowing water and drifting clouds, water rises and wind arises."

It was actually the simplest of all the techniques, like a gentle spring breeze and nourishing rain.

A sense of confusion and wariness arose in the monk's heart. The wind blew a large patch of dark clouds over his head, and a light drizzle fell on his shoulders.

He casually brushed away the dark clouds, but a sudden, excruciating pain shot through his body: "Ouch! That hurts!"

The cultivator was riddled with countless poisoned water needles, his robes instantly stained crimson with blood!

With the cultivator powerless to resist, Ruan Chayan seized the opportunity to deliver a fatal blow to the throat and chased after the female cultivator who wanted to help the Nascent Soul cultivator break the talisman array.

By this time, Luo Hanying's battle had ended. The corpses of the cultivators who had entered the formation lay scattered on the ground. Killing them was easier than she had imagined, but it would take her a while to recover.

Seeing that Luo Hanying was still able to move, Mu Qing handed her the water pouch.

Luo Hanying gulped down several mouthfuls of water, then said breathlessly, "You don't look like a blind person at all."

Mu Qing replied, “Some people have damaged their spiritual sense or are born blind, so they can’t see at all. I am different. My eyes were injured later in life. Before the injury, I was already able to use my spiritual sense, so now I can use my spiritual sense to see and perceive.”

"I see."

After checking the integrity of the formation, Luo Hanying turned her face away from the corpses on the ground and said worriedly, "I'll guard this place. Go and help Chacha and the others. I don't think Widow Qiao and the Wine Monk are doing well."

Widow Qiao, covered in dust and grime, sat in meditation within the array's range, her body bearing several wounds, her robes stained with blood.

The drunken monk waved his gourd with one hand to block the cultivators' path and prevent them from attacking Ruan Chayan. His right arm swung back and forth at his side, indicating that he was already at his limit.

Mu Qing gathered her spiritual power at her feet, flew to the side of the drunken monk, and opened her tattered umbrella to protect him.

Sichuan pepper barked twice, its mouth dry, and leaped off Ruan Chayan's shoulder, disappearing into the spirit beast pouch. The two Golden Core cultivators who had been pulled into the illusion were dead, and the remaining cultivators were severely injured, with one of them, a Nascent Soul cultivator, appearing dazed.

Ruan Chayan was entangled in a battle with several cultivators. The two Nascent Soul stage cultivators forcibly broke through the talisman array. Although Ruan Chayan and her group were currently at a disadvantage, Taibai Xie did not dare to fight them to the death. Taibai Xie fought and retreated, flying away from the place.

The leading male cultivator at the Nascent Soul stage didn't forget to utter a harsh threat: "You were just lucky tonight. Next time, you'll all be thrown into the cauldron and turned into spiritual energy!"

Ruan Chayan breathed a sigh of relief. She clutched her aching dantian, thinking how fortunate they had retreated, otherwise she wouldn't have lasted much longer. She searched for medicinal pills to treat her internal injuries.

After this fierce battle, only Mu Qing was completely unharmed.

"Although Widow Qiao's injuries are severe, they are easy to treat. With a few months of rest and medication, she will be fine."

After taking the pulse, Mu Qing gently touched the drunken monk's right arm. "Your arm problem is quite serious. Your meridians are broken and your bones are shattered. I'm not a pill refiner or a doctor, so I can't do anything about your arm."

Looking at the monk's twisted right arm, Ruan Chayan felt a wave of guilt wash over her: "It's all my fault. If I had been more careful, I wouldn't have been caught off guard. You got hurt while trying to save me."

"Just tell me what kind of elixir you need, and I'll see if I have any here. If not, I'll go to the market to buy some once we're safe."

The monk took a swig of wine, and while using acupressure to seal the sensation in his right arm and stabilize the injury, he said nonchalantly, "What are you saying, girl?"

"I saved you because you were protecting me. If it weren't for you, with my current cultivation level, I might not have been able to escape unscathed from so many people."

Ruan Chayan wanted to say something more, but Mu Qing directly named several kinds of pills and elixirs, asking everyone if they had any, and how much, that could stabilize the wine monk's current condition and prevent his right arm from becoming necrotic.

“I actually have this!” Ruan Chayan’s surprised expression froze. “I just don’t know if it still has any medicinal effect. This medicine is over a thousand years old.”

She placed the two jade bottles, sealed with talismans, into Mu Qing's hands, gesturing for him to check if they could be used.

Mu Qing tore off the sealed talisman, pulled out the stopper, and sniffed the smell. He said uncertainly, "It should work. The smell is indeed faint. Let's try it as a last resort. Anyway, we don't have any better options right now."

The drunken monk then consumed the elixir and sat cross-legged to refine its medicinal properties.

Luo Hanying asked in a low voice, "How are you? You fought with so many people, were you injured?"

Ruan Chayan shook her head: "It's not serious. Although it still hurts now, it will get better slowly after taking the medicine."

And you? I see you've created a vast illusion, and even killed those people within it. How's your dantian (energy center)?

"I'm not seriously injured. Killing them was much easier than I thought. They couldn't find any trace of the illusion's formation and were just running around in the formation like headless flies."

Luo Hanying held her head and said, "It's a bit hard to describe how I feel right now. My mind is a mess, and I feel dizzy and lightheaded. I feel like my brain is pounding like a drum."

Ruan Chayan patted Luo Hanying's head: "It's okay, it's okay, we did nothing wrong. If we hadn't done it, we would be the ones dead now."

The weaker ones who had been protected voluntarily left the formation. They took it upon themselves to dispose of the corpses of the Taibai Pavilion cultivators, and even had a few arguments over the unequal distribution of spoils while cleaning up the battlefield.

Luo Hanying glanced at the noisy crowd, watching them scramble for the deceased cultivator's Qiankun bag, storage necklace, and other items. In despair, she slapped her forehead and leaned against Ruan Chayan's back to rest.