Surprisingly, the abnormality in the Gigantes Illusion Zone had helped Tang Jie escape the entanglements of Ji Wujiu and smoothly reach the Devil Crushing Path.
As he stepped onto the road, he looked around, taking in the scenery.
This Devil Crushing Path was called a road, but it was actually surrounded by dense forests. The forests seemed peaceful, but they concealed numerous savage beasts and birds, traps and mechanisms, mazes and illusions. Thus, stepping onto the Devil Crushing Path did not mean that one was safe.
However, Tang Jie only cared that the path itself was peaceful and showed no traces of fighting. This meant that no one had gotten here before him and that he was probably the first to reach the Devil Crushing Path.
Upon confirming this, Tang Jie relaxed and confidently strode forward.
He walked at a measured pace, carefully inspecting the vicinity.
As he walked along this forest path, a huge spotted beast rushed out from the trees and took a bite at Tang Jie.
Tang Jie grabbed its neck without even looking and threw it aside.
The fiend beasts of Wind Devil Island were of average strength and were barely worth Tang Jie’s attention. His true concern was the topography of the Devil Crushing Path.
As he got closer and closer to the Nine Palace Heart Ring, Tang Jie finally found what he was looking for.
Twenty meters ahead of him, the Devil Crushing Path abruptly narrowed, two rising mountain walls turning the path into a thin ribbon of a road.
And in front of this narrow path was a thick forest that concealed unknown dangers.
It was a natural chokepoint.
Tang Jie looked around and nodded in satisfaction. “This is the place. Yiyi, we can start.”
He reached into his Mustard Seed Bag.
At this moment, a saber swung at the back of Tang Jie’s head.
This attack was made right as Tang Jie’s right hand was in his Mustard Seed Bag. With one arm occupied and the attack coming at the back of his head, it could be said that he was powerless to fight back.
The timing of the attack was simply exquisite, and the ambusher felt like there was no way he could choose a better moment, satisfaction filling his heart.
The saber flew through the air with a chilling pressure.
Whoosh!
But the expected splash of blood did not transpire, nor did he hear the predicted howl of misery.
The edge of the saber brushed past Tang Jie’s body, missing him by a centimeter.
Tang Jie hadn’t even needed to move.
What… what’s going on?
The ambusher froze.
His saber had brushed past Tang Jie as if he hadn’t aimed accurately enough and had missed.
But after a brief moment of shock, he realized what was going on.
This was clearly the misperception effect of the Nine Palace Illusion Formation. Everyone would suffer from slight vision deviation in the formation, throwing their aim off.
But the illusion formation did not have an effect on the Devil Crushing Path, so where had this misperception effect come from, and when had it started?
The ambusher couldn’t understand, nor did he have time to understand.
As his saber missed, Tang Jie moved.
He had his back to the attacker, but rather than turning around, he took a step back, crashing into the attacker’s chest. He then raised his left elbow, striking the attacker in the face.
Since he was just stepping back and raising his elbow, this counterattack was swift, and with a boom, his steel elbow slammed into the ambusher’s face and sent him flying. The force shattered the bridge of the attacker’s nose, stabbing several bone fragments into his face and causing him to throw back his head and howl in pain.
But he was still an experienced fighter. As he flew up, his saber erupted with light, and he unleashed a saber gale, but instead of Tang Jie, it was aimed at the empty space in front of him.
Tang Jie didn’t chase, standing where he was, and this saber gale completely missed. Meanwhile, the little tiger used this chance to unleash a lightning blade at him.
But while this lightning blade was aimed at his face, it instead struck the waist of the attacker, clearly affected by the vision deviation. The ambusher failed to dodge and spat out blood.
At the same time, Tang Jie finally extracted his hand from the Mustard Seed Bag. In it was a talisman.
He threw out the talisman, which turned into a giant silver sword that slashed at the attacker.
“The Heavenly Pearl Slash Talisman!” the ambusher yowled in fear.
This Heavenly Pearl Slash Talisman was an art talisman, a spell art that was used by Mortal Shedding Realm cultivators. Its immense power was something that not even the ambusher dared to take.
But he was unable to evade this sudden attack, so all he could do was swing his saber, light erupting from its tip.
As the blades clashed, the enormous explosion of power created a windstorm on the ground.
The ambusher screamed as he was blasted away by the sword.
Though he was strong, he had been caught off guard and only able to use thirty percent of his strength. Thus, the Heavenly Pearl Slash Talisman had managed to get the upper hand on him and severely injure him.
He flew several dozen meters before finally landing, but even so, he managed to fire off ten-some waves of saber energy that covered all angles around him so that he wouldn’t be pursued.
This brief clash had caused the ambusher to be ambushed and heavily injured, and his mind was deeply shaken.
Tang Jie slowly turned around to face the ambusher.
The ambusher had a black cloth on his face so that Tang Jie couldn’t recognize him, but this black cloth was now dyed red with blood.
Tang Jie chuckled. “It doesn’t seem like such self-deceiving methods are necessary, yes? If my guess is right, you must be Zhang Qinan, Sir Zhang.”
Yiyi and the little tiger flew up to Tang Jie’s side, protecting his flanks.
The ambusher used his saber to support himself as he stood, and when he heard this, he stopped trying to hide and tore off the black cloth, revealing that it truly was Qinan. “So you were ready for me!”
“That isn’t weird, right?” Tang Jie replied. “I was able to find you when everyone was disembarking, so how couldn’t I set up defenses against you? If there was anyone among the Basking Moon students who could get to the Devil Crushing Path before me, it was you. And only you would reach the Devil Crushing Path yet not enter the Nine Palace Heart Ring!”
Qinan’s biggest problem was that he didn’t know that Tang Jie cultivated the Eye of Heaven.
Under the Eye of Heaven, the vast majority of concealment spells had no effect.
While Qinan had a high cultivation level, in terms of spell arts, his were far inferior to those of the Divine Firmament Sword Classic.
If spell arts had priority, the Eye of Heaven had far greater priority over Qinan’s concealment spell. Hiding from Tang Jie was easier said than done.
Of course, while the Eye of Heaven could see through spells, it couldn’t see through the black cloth.
However, the Basking Moon students were after the True Inheritance. If someone else had gotten to the Devil Crushing Path before Tang Jie, they certainly wouldn’t have any interest in sticking around to ambush him.
Only Qinan would do such a thing.
He had chosen a sneak attack for the same reason—he needed to end the battle as quickly as possible to avoid other students noticing him.
But he hadn’t expected Tang Jie to use this against him.
A small illusion formation had caused his attack to miss, and the ensuing counterattack had put him in an awkward spot.
Qinan almost wanted to vomit blood at this thought, but there was still something that he didn’t understand. “You knew that I was going to ambush you, so you still gave me a chance?”
Although Tang Jie had succeeded in using that moment that heavily wound him, he had also put himself in considerable danger.
The vision deviation of the illusion formation was limited, and so long as Qinan had chosen to swing the saber horizontally rather than vertically, Tang Jie wouldn’t have been able to dodge.
It was precisely because he had slashed vertically that the illusion formation had been able to work its magic and make him miss.
This was exactly what Qinan didn’t understand. Since he had known that Qinan was coming, why take the risk?
Tang Jie sighed. “There was nothing else I could do. You’re still a Mortal Shedding Realm cultivator. Even if you’re only at the Hundred Refinement Period, you’re still not someone I can deal with. To be a little more presumptuous, even if I used everything I had and managed to overcome you despite being weaker, how much would I have to sacrifice? And how would I deal with the battles after that?”
Qinan finally understood. “So you baited me into attacking you so that you had a chance to severely injure me?”
The problem with concealment spells was that one couldn’t use any other spell art while the concealment was active. After all, concealment spells worked on the body, not on external barriers created from spiritual energy.
This was precisely why cultivators in stealth were undefended.
This was exactly what Tang Jie needed.
In a proper battle, Qinan could use his Mortal Shedding Realm strength to cast a few barriers, and then no matter how strong the Heavenly Pearl Slash Talisman was, it wouldn’t be able to injure him to the extent that it had.
But in a situation where his ambush had failed and he didn’t have time to use a protective spell, the Heavenly Pearl Slash would be able to apply the vast majority of its power, something that he couldn’t take.
An ambusher couldn’t put up defenses!
If he weren’t at the Hundred Refinement Period, no longer possessing the body of a mortal, that one attack would have killed him.
He was currently like Gu Changqing in the Cloud Marsh or the Frost Fairy in the Ice Cave, but Tang Jie was no longer the same Tang Jie.
What Tang Jie wanted wasn’t just to defeat Qinan, but to defeat this interfering fellow at the smallest price possible.
For this, he did not mind risking himself.
This was because he had no other choice.
Upon realizing this, Qinan swayed back and forth as he began to laugh. “Good! Very good, Tang Jie. My ambush failed, and I fell into your trap instead! You’re ruthless! But even if you’ve heavily injured me, I’m not so easily dealt with. I might have lost this battle, but if you want to reserve strength to deal with the other students, don’t even think about it!”
“Mm. If Sir Qinan were to go all out, this truly would be possible.” Tang Jie chuckled. “But, Sir Qinan, if you were to die here, you would become proof that Sir Nan was interfering with the student assessment. Are you sure that you want to fight to the death here?”
Zhang Qinan shuddered.
Nan Baicheng wanted to stop Wei Tianchong from getting first place, so why didn’t he try to do anything himself? Why had he ordered Zhang Qinan to not expose himself no matter what? Wasn’t it precisely so as to not leave behind evidence for others to use?
Factional battles were fierce within the Basking Moon Sect, and no one knew when some incriminating evidence might end up in the hands of another.
If it became known that there was something fishy going on in Yan Changfeng’s True Inheritor test, True Person Changfeng’s dignity would be dealt a heavy blow.
A person of high status already had wealth and power, so all they sought was dignity and face.
Why was Nan Baicheng so dead set on Wei Tianchong not becoming Yan Changfeng’s disciple?
Wasn’t it all because of face?
Otherwise, what did it matter if he had an incompetent disciple?
Zhang Qinan could go all out, but if his corpse ended up becoming firm proof that True Person Changfeng’s disciple was engaging in fraud, his death would bring him no merit, only condemnation.
Tang Jie’s one sentence pushed Zhang Qinan into an awkward spot.
Tang Jie slowly stepped to the side, opening the path to the Nine Palace Heart Ring. “Sir Zhang, you should take this chance while no one has noticed to quickly leave this place. So long as Sir Zhang promises to not attack me, I, Tang Jie, swear on my Heart Demon that I will reveal nothing about this to the outside world.”
Zhang Qinan began to laugh. “Junior, you’re actually threatening me. Do you really think that everyone in the world will fall for your schemes?”
His eyes flashed with savage killing intent. He drew back his saber and began to form hand signs, and as his hands rapidly shifted, spiritual energy surged, building up into a lethal force.