“When did I say that you could leave if you won?” Tang Jie decided to just lie down on the ground as he lazily replied, seizing every moment he could to recover his energy.
In truth, with his level of strength, if he really wanted to fight with Peng Yaolong to the bitter end, Peng Yaolong wouldn’t be guaranteed to last against his recovery abilities.
But this wasn’t necessary. With Yiyi and the little tiger around, he could save both energy and time.
He had not had them strike earlier primarily because he feared Peng Yaolong’s savage strength. Tang Jie could send an upper-grade fiend beast like the Violet Ember Wolf flying with a single punch, and Yiyi and the little tiger were only of middle grade. Having them carelessly face Peng Yaolong might end with them being heavily injured.
This was precisely why Tang Jie had gone all-out, using himself to wear out Peng Yaolong. Now, however, Peng Yaolong was no longer as strong. Moreover, Peng Yaolong was usually so strong that the only way to bind him would be to wear him out first.
The little tiger rushed in first, callously firing a lightning blade at Peng Yaolong. Peng Yaolong roared and scattered the lightning blade with a punch, and then he roared, “Tang Jie, you scoundrel!”
“This isn’t a duel, Great Brother!” Tang Jie firmly replied.
The little tiger and Yiyi rushed up, and under the repeated attacks of the two middle-grade creatures, Peng Yaolong began to falter. He bellowed and punched again and again, but despite his intimidating aura, his strength began to wane. Finally, Yiyi saw that the moment was right, and ten-some vines coiled around him and dragged him into the formation.
Peng Yaolong shouted, “Tang Jie, you can’t hold me!”
But no matter how he struggled, he couldn’t break free, and all it did was make his energy drain away faster.
Next to him, Su Xinyue weakly said, “It’s useless. Tang Jie was ready for this. He’s laid down a chain formation, and one of the formations is an energy-draining formation. These vines that bind us will drain away any energy we manage to recover to power the formation, thus creating a regenerative cycle.”
Peng Yaolong was aghast, and he quickly realized that Su Xinyue was right. Whenever he managed to recover a little energy, the flower vines would drain it away.
This bastard had made them the formation energy source, draining their energy so that he could imprison more people in the formation.
“Tang Jie, you bastard!” Peng Yaolong furiously roared. “You won’t be able to hold me!”
Tang Jie ignored him and continued to recover.
For him, the only correct path was to use every free moment he had to rest.
The most ideal scenario was that he would finish resting right when another person came in.
Unfortunately, reality rarely went as one wanted.
The battle with Peng Yaolong had consumed too much of his strength, and after he had recovered only a little, another person appeared in the distance.
It was Long Dao this time.
Tang Jie sighed. He didn’t have much of a friendship with Long Dao, so he didn’t mince words and instantly swung his saber.
“Tang Jie?” Long Dao hadn’t expected to be attacked the moment he emerged from the formation. He didn’t have time to use a spell art, so he slapped his waist, and a defensive barrier emerged just in time for Tang Jie to blast him back with a punch.
The enormous collision caused Long Dao’s vision to blur as Tang Jie swung his saber again.
Alarmed and with no time to cast a spell, Long Dao threw out a small golden bell.
“The Jade Return Bell,” Tang Jie grunted as he swung his saber at the bell, and with a clang, the bell was sent back the way it had come.
But a moment later, Long Dao took out a piece of jade and threw it at Tang Jie, and this was followed by an array of talismans, a blade of ice and a fireball flying at him. Tang Jie was finally forced to dodge, but he also looked at Peng Yaolong and shook his head. “Such a spendthrift.”
As the son of a True Person, Long Dao truly had many excellent possessions, even numerous spell weapons. Despite the fact that he had yet to enter Mortal Shedding, he probably even had a few art relics.
Alas, while he had many spell weapons, unlike Tang Jie and the others, he had relied entirely on resources to reach his current level of strength, so he lacked combat experience and only had a will to fight. A sneak attack had caught him off guard, and in his panic, he simply threw out everything he had.
Peng Yaolong needed to watch for only a few moments to know that Long Dao was no match for Tang Jie and that his defeat was only a matter of time.
Tang Jie was right. While more and more students would appear, it was on a gradually descending scale of strength. As quantity rose, quality was bound to take a dip.
Was Tang Jie really going to hold the path until Wei Tianchong arrived?
Peng Yaolong grew frustrated.
At this moment, Su Xinyue suddenly whispered, “Senior Brother Peng, listen to me. In truth, your junior sister understands a little about formations.”
“Oh?” Peng Yaolong looked at Su Xinyue. This girl had hidden her strength this entire time, arriving at the Devil Crushing Path even faster than he had and leaving him surprised. It made sense that she had learned about formations in secret.
Su Xinyue first glanced at Long Dao and Tang Jie battling and then glanced at the distant Heaventopple Stamp. She softly said, “That Heaventopple Stamp blocks the Life Gate of the Nine Palace Illusion Formation. Do you know what the purpose of that is?”
Before he could reply, Su Xinyue said, “It’s used to send students back to the Nine Palace Illusion Formation.”
Peng Yaolong’s eyes brightened as he immediately caught on to what Su Xinyue was saying. “So you’re saying that…”
“Tang Jie said before that he wasn’t the first to reach the Devil Crushing Path. He isn’t lying, as the Life Gate being blocked is proof. This matter was clearly beyond his expectations.”
“What about it?” Peng Yaolong was confused.
Su Xinyue rolled her eyes and continued, “We’re currently in a chain formation, and I can only recognize two of them. Besides the energy-draining formation, there’s also the Eight Desolations Illusion Formation, the one that was used in the Valley of No Return to hold all of us.”
“So he was the one who did that!” Peng Yaolong gnashed his teeth.
Su Xinyue angrily rolled her eyes again. “Great Brother, that’s not important. Don’t you get it? Tang Jie’s original plan was probably to use this illusion formation to impede strong foes while sending people he defeated back into the illusion formation through the Life Gate. But has he used this formation in his battles?”
Peng Yaolong finally got it. “You’re saying that he only thought of the energy-draining formation later?”
“Correct!” Su Xinyue sternly said. “Unable to do anything about the Life Gate being blocked, he turned what should have been his stronghold into a cage. Do you understand what that means?”
Peng Yaolong seriously pondered this for a while. “It means that he was unprepared for this, so this energy-draining formation is the lowest level, using the vines as the foundation and spiritual energy as the lines.”
“Correct!” Su Xinyue confirmed. “It’s precisely because it was made in haste that we still have a chance.”
“What do we do?”
“Calm your energy and circulate Circuit Heavens…”
“AAAAAH! I’ll chop you up! Chop you up! Chop you to death!” Wei Tianchong shouted as he flailed his little axe, chopping a gold-and-blue-eyed python into ten-some chunks before weakly dropping to the ground.
His body was covered in blood, but there were still numerous doors of light twinkling in this space.
He had already opened ten-some doors. Behind each door was a vicious beast, an insidious plant, or a sinister trap, and several of them had been extremely dangerous.
More doors of light were still twinkling, and there was no telling which one was the correct door or how much longer this would take.
“Bastard!” Wei Tianchong furiously roared into the void, “I chose the left path! The left path! I didn’t want illusion formations, you shameless frauds!”
But there was no reply to his bellows.
As he looked at the doors of light, Wei Tianchong could no longer restrain himself, hugging his head and bawling, “Tang Jie… I’m sorry… I can’t do it… I can’t get out…”
As he wept, there was no one around to comfort him. There was only the little fox, who silently watched him, its eyes twinkling in thought.
After crying for a while, Wei Tianchong stood back up, wiped his tears, and walked to another door, mumbling, “Damn you, I’ll have your head!”
He opened the door, and without even looking, he threw in a large fireball. A female ghost charged out of the door and immediately got a fireball to the face, stopping it in its tracks. A moment later, the shadow soldier, puppet, and axe hacked it to death.
Nan Baicheng was rendered speechless by the sight.
He thought to himself, This kid’s soft personality hides a hard streak, and he’s quite the fierce sort. Unfortunately, he can’t control his rapidly fluctuating personality. It’s quite unfortunate that he can’t exactly control when he decides to go all-out.
He turned to look at Ji Wujiu, who had just recovered from the shock given to him by the incident in the Gigantes Illusion Zone and was lost in thought. All Nan Baicheng could say was, “Brother Ji, there is no need to worry. Once this matter is over, I will give a full account to your superiors and take all the blame.”
He wasn’t a member of Horizon Ocean Pavilion, and so even if he took the blame for Ji Wujiu, he wouldn’t have to worry about Horizon Ocean Pavilion doing anything too bad to him.
Ji Wujiu shook his head. “It’s not that simple. The Nine Disaster Fiend Monk borrowed the illusion to manifest, and his fiend energy soared into the heavens. This can be hidden from some people, but there’s no hiding it from those grand ancestors.”
Nan Baicheng chuckled. “If they found out, they found out. It was just a sliver of will and not some big deal. I’m sure it’s not worth them asking questions.”
“Hopefully,” Ji Wujiu sighed. He could only hope that everything went as Nan Baicheng said.
At this moment, a child entered the room and shouted, “Reporting! The Pufeng County Lord seeks an audience!”
Ji Wujiu was startled. “Wasn’t she outside trying her skills on the formation?”
“It wasn’t fun, so I naturally stopped!” a melodious voice replied, and Xu Miaoran came in without an invitation.
Ji Wujiu hastily got to his feet and bowed. “Ji Wujiu pays respects to the county lord.”
Xu Miaoran strode over and loudly said, “Senior Brother Ji is being too polite. You are Martial Uncle Hong’s disciple, so we are part of the same generation. As both your age and cultivation are higher than mine, I should be bowing to you.”
Despite her words, she showed no sign of bowing. She walked up to the six-edged crystal and glanced at the scene playing out on it.
She had never seen Wei Tianchong before, but she recognized the illusion zone. “Oh? The Prison of Mortal Coil? Which student is so fortunate that they require Senior Brother to use his Prison of Mortal Coil on him?”
Ji Wujiu was just about to reply when Nan Baicheng lightly coughed. “County Lord has come from afar and must be tired. Why not go and rest?”
He didn’t know about Xu Miaoran’s relationship to Tang Jie, but his many years of experience told him that Xu Miaoran’s visit was suspicious and that it was best that she not be allowed to interfere.
“Oh?” Xu Miaoran raised an eyebrow. “And who are you?”
Ji Wujiu hastily introduced, “This is Nan Baicheng of the Basking Moon Sect. He is the proctor for this contest between the Basking Moon students.”
Xu Miaoran snorted. “No wonder you spoke to me in such a tone, trying to shoo me out the moment I arrived.”
Nan Baicheng smiled. “County Lord, you misunderstand. It is just that this is a test for the students of my Basking Moon Sect, and it is not right for outsiders to intervene.”
“Oh? And here I thought that this Wind Devil Island belonged to my Horizon Ocean Pavilion.”
Nan Baicheng immediately replied, “Wind Devil Island naturally belongs to Horizon Ocean Pavilion, but the people inside are part of my Basking Moon Sect, so it is best if County Lord does not interfere. Such an action might damage the harmony between the two sects, which I am sure neither of us want.”
He showed no signs of backing down.