A magical journey of a sharp-tongued woman and a goofy man

The sea breeze, carrying a salty smell, swept across the rocky beach, and sparks popped from the campfire.

Ye Shuli poked at the charred eel with a twig, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jiang Ye stringing together seashells he had collected into a wind chime.

The remnants of the array that repaired the crystal rock layer shimmered faintly behind them, like a fallen starry sky.

“We should go find Old Zhang to repair the boat tomorrow.” Jiang Ye dangled his newly woven seashell necklace. “You said we could use the remaining spirit stones to exchange for two jars of…” His words stopped the moment he looked up—the spirit patterns on the back of Ye Shuli’s neck were emanating a pale golden halo, and that stream of light traveled along her spine, finally condensing into half a phoenix tail feather at the tip of her hair.

Ye Shuli suddenly pressed down on the back of her neck, and the branch used to grill eels carved messy grooves in the sand.

The black chip remaining in his palm suddenly became hot. The poison crystal fragments that he had intercepted in the crevice of the reef three days ago were now resonating with the spirit pattern.

She took out the jade slip she kept close to her body, and the vibration frequency she had previously recorded was forming raised engravings on the surface of the jade slip.

"An urgent summons from the Ling Shu Palace." She crushed the dewdrops condensed on the seashell wind chimes, and ice crystals condensed into a palm-sized water mirror between her fingers.

The mirror did not reflect the two people, but rather twelve intersecting and rotating star trails, which were the highest-level communication symbols of the Elder Council.

Jiang Ye took off the jade pendant and threw it into the fire, and the leaping flames immediately turned bluish-white.

As the pendant and the spirit pearl in Ye Shuli's arms trembled simultaneously, he deftly drew his soft sword from his waist and sliced ​​his fingertip: "The blood pact's sensing range has expanded to three hundred miles. Is that enough for you to set up a teleportation array?"

Preparations before departure continued until the moon sank into the western sea.

Ye Shuli inserted the improved protective array diagram into the interlayer of the beams and pillars of the fishing village ancestral hall. When the array is activated, it will form a light purple light shield that covers the entire bay.

Jiang Ye squatted on the dock, carving water-repelling spells on each fishing boat. Just as he finished carving the last stroke, he happened to steal two jars of Old Zhang's treasured twenty-year-old vintage wine.

"Remember to save me some coral powder." Qiu Niangzi, the rouge seller, stuffed three boxes of cinnabar into Ye Shuli's bag, her finger lightly touching the fluorescent moss stained her cuff. "The newly grown moonflower grass on the northern cliff, crushed and applied to wounds, is more effective than any wound medicine."

The teleportation array was activated at high tide.

Jiang Ye embedded the jade pendant into the array's eye, while Ye Shuli cut her wrist and dripped blood onto the dent in the spirit pearl.

The moment the seawater reached their ankles, seventy-two runes lit up simultaneously, and the sound of the waves was mixed with the faint chimes of chimes.

The fishermen who came to see them off only saw two figures shrouded in golden light, and seven green waves that suddenly exploded on the sea surface—the exact same distribution as the phosphorescent fire three days ago.

The fierce winds at the entrance to the spirit world tore apart Jiang Ye's hair tie.

Ye Shuli flicked out a silver thread that wrapped around his wrist, with her modified wind-fixing bead tied to the other end.

The distorted space before them was filled with patterns resembling shattered glass, and the protective jade pendants worn by the two were cracking at a visible speed.

"Hold on tight!" Ye Shuli slapped the spirit pearl into Jiang Ye's chest, while she herself held the black crystal that had become scorching hot.

A blurry human face suddenly appeared amidst the intersecting streams of light, overlapping with the face that had previously flashed in the pendant's phantom.

Jiang Ye threw the soft sword with a backhand. The moment the sword pierced through the illusory image, the golden light enveloping them suddenly surged.

As their feet touched solid ground, the stench of decaying spiritual plants assaulted their senses.

Ye Shuli staggered and grabbed onto a giant tree with grayish leaves, her palm getting smeared with the scarlet resin exposed after the bark had peeled off.

Jiang Ye's soft sword was stuck diagonally in the rock five steps away, its blade covered with a layer of evaporating frost.

Behind them, a boundary marker engraved with a phoenix totem was broken in half, and the inscription still bore the scorched marks of burning.

Ye Shuli crouched down and stroked the cracked earth, feeling intermittent tremors coming from her fingertips.

This vibration frequency was seventeen pristine units lower than the value she recorded, yet it perfectly matched the initial fluctuations generated by the black chip.

She turned to look at Jiang Ye and found him staring at a distorted halo on the horizon—that should have been the eternal sun of the spirit world.

Ye Shuli's fingertips traced pale blue light marks on the cracked earth, as modern physics' spectral analysis and spirit detection techniques danced and intertwined in her palm.

The data stream condensed into a semi-transparent chart in the void, and seventeen abnormal resonance points spread like festering sores across the spiritual network.

Jiang Ye's soft sword suddenly emitted a buzzing sound, and the poison-detecting stone embedded in the hilt glowed with a purple light.

Suddenly, the giant gray-leaved tree, three zhang away, burst open, and hundreds of vines covered with crystalline protrusions burst forth from the ground.

These mutated plants have a tar-like slime flowing from their surface, and each vine has a structure resembling human teeth.

"Take three steps back!" Ye Shuli threw out the improved version of the Wind-Fixing Bead, and a light blue barrier instantly enveloped the two of them.

The vines scraped against the protective shield with a metallic scraping sound, their serrated structure gnawed at the spiritual energy barrier, and the sparks that flew up scorched the ground.

Jiang Ye took out the iron caltrops he had smuggled from the fishing village from his waist belt, infused them with spiritual power, and precisely shot them into the joints of the vines.

The hit area immediately expanded and burst, the purplish-red liquid corroding the rock into honeycomb-like holes. "They're afraid of salt!" he noticed, observing the liquid contract violently when it encountered salt particles condensed by the sea breeze.

Ye Shuli immediately understood and pulled out the leather pouch containing the coral powder from her bag.

Her modern chemical knowledge allowed her to instantly calculate the optimal ratio, and the coral sand mixed with moonflower powder traced a parabola in the air before landing precisely on the roots of the vines.

The mutated plants that came into contact with the salt and alkali mixture emitted a shrill cry like a baby's wail and quickly dried up into grayish-white residue.

When the battle ended, Jiang Ye picked out a black crystal the size of a grain of rice from the vine debris.

The crystal resonated with the poison crystal fragment in Ye Shuli's arms, refracting a morbid seven-colored halo under the moonlight.

"Someone has poisoned the source of the spiritual vein." Ye Shuli used silver threads to wrap around the crystal to isolate it, and the jade slip automatically recorded the energy fluctuation curve.

She noticed a striking similarity in the curve's trajectory to the red tide that erupted in the fishing village three months prior, noting that "this pollution can spread through the food chain."

After traversing the corrupt jungle, they discovered the detection device of the Ling Shu Temple at the abandoned post station.

Ye Shuli used a hairpin to pry open the bronze casing, and the internal gear structure was found to be similar to the principle of a modern oscilloscope.

When she brought the toxic crystal close to the detection probe, all twelve jade needles on the dashboard simultaneously pointed in the direction of the boundary marker.

Jiang Ye suddenly pressed down on her shoulder, using the tip of his sword to pry open the spiderwebs hanging from the eaves.

The spider silk was covered with ice crystals, making it appear unusual in the humid, hot air.

He dipped his fingers into the ice crystals on the spider silk and drew talismans on his palm. The icy blue runes revealed the emblem of an elder from the spirit world.

“The detection device has been tampered with,” Ye Shuli said, pointing to the escapement installed in reverse in the gear set. “The actual data should be thirty times higher than the displayed value.” She input the fluctuation frequency recorded on the jade slip into the device, and the projected spiritual vein diagram was immediately covered with blood-red spots.

As dusk fell, the familiar scent made them both turn around at the same time.

Ji Linyuan emerged from the distorted light, his moon-white robe spotless, creating an ironic contrast with the dilapidated surroundings.

He toyed with the black crystal that shared the same origin as the poison crystal with his fingertips, a sinister glint flashing in his eyes as he glanced at Jiang Ye.

“Junior Sister Shuli is still as intelligent as ever.” Ji Linyuan crushed the crystal, and the purplish-black powder condensed into a map of the spirit world in the air. “Three questions for three answers, how about it?” He deliberately showed the freshly scabbed wound on his wrist—it was Ye Shuli’s unique hemostatic and bandaging technique.

Jiang Ye suddenly laughed out loud and took out a grilled eel wrapped in oil paper from his pocket.

The salt frost on the surface of the eel, activated by spiritual energy, formed a miniature barrier, perfectly blocking Ji Linyuan's attempt to entangle Ye Shuli with his mind-reading technique. "Senior Brother Ji, perhaps you should first explain why you possess the aura of mutated vines?"