Outside the formation.
If the world inside the formation was Tang Jie’s one-man show, and one-sided slaughter that utilized his advantage in location, the world outside was a battle with a very lopsided balance in strength and an outcome that was difficult to predict, a melee with all sorts of ups and downs.
The lopsided balance in strength was because the fiends had the numbers. Twenty-some fiend beasts were charging in, overwhelming Yiyi and the little tiger in terms of momentum.
The battle’s outcome was difficult to predict and had all sorts of ups and downs because the offensive and defensive sides were switching so quickly that it was hard to keep up.
The Fragrant Store Cave fiends, with their vast advantage in numbers, had been caught off guard by Yiyi and the little tiger and received a savage beating.
The moment the flower formation had emerged, a vast number of green vines just like those of the Yi Wood Azure Heaven Formation rose up and coiled around the fiends, creating a hell of thorns.
Yiyi’s flower formation was a spell art that was ideal for locational and defensive battles. Even though it couldn’t match the Yi Wood Azure Heaven Formation, at least at the moment of activation, it could be said to have achieved the same effect.
As the fiends were imprisoned, the little tiger lunged out and took a big bite at a lower-grade fiend, lunging out as Tang Jie had.
The scene was just like what was going on in the formation, both worlds moving in unison at this specific moment in time. The little tiger was crazily tearing through the imprisoned fiends, his teeth and claws serving as the finest weapons. Without using any spell arts, he tore at the veins of the fiends, ripped apart their flesh, and feasted upon them.
But this fine feeling lasted for only an extremely short moment.
As the little tiger’s sharp claws were tearing open the throat of a second fiend, an upper-grade black bear broke free of the flower formation, the flower vines snapping under the bear’s freakish strength. The bear strode out and swatted the tiger away.
The tiger opened its wings, flew a circle in the air, and then shot at the bear like a lightning bolt. But the giant bear took the blow without a problem. It grabbed a vine and swung it through the air, and the dirt on the vine instantly turned into a stone pellet tougher than steel that smashed into the little tiger.
The little tiger yowled and immediately turned tail.
Even in a one-versus-one, he was no match for the black bear.
Awooo! With a savage roar, the fiends cast various spells. Ice, fire, and light blasted apart the vines and sent numerous petals into the air.
In the space of a few seconds, most of the fiends had broken through. Yiyi’s flower formation had existed for the shortest time in its history before collapsing. The fiends surged toward Yiyi, and once they got close, they would need only a few seconds to tear her apart.
The tables had almost instantly turned!
Yiyi’s eyes suddenly flashed with a white light.
She looked up at the petals dancing in the air.
Under her gaze, the petals began to dance,spinning faster and faster. They turned into flying saws, blasting at the fiends from all sides and cutting bloody wounds across their tough skins.
The fiend wolf charging at the very front was the most unfortunate of all. Several hundred petals whistled into its body, throwing it up into the sky.
Divine Firmament Secret Art: Petal Rain!
With Tang Jie’s instruction, Yiyi was superior in spell arts to even an average Mind Opening fiend.
This explosive attack left almost all the fiends wounded, with that fiend wolf dying a gruesome death. But fiend beasts were bold and dauntless. Heavy wounds only ignited their ruthless nature and caused them to charge more savagely.
But as they lunged, Yiyi’s eyes flashed once more. Large amounts of white fog surged up, caused by none other than the illusion formation that she was an expert in.
She had been born with the ability to cast this illusion formation, and it could be considered her natural spell art. Through years of use and practice, she could use it in an instant. With the emergence of the white fog, the fiends completely lost sight of her.
There was a flash of lightning as the little tiger used the cover of the illusion formation to attack again.
Yiyi provided cover while the little tiger attacked, the fiend and sprite working together flawlessly.
But just like the Yi Wood Azure Heaven Formation and the flower formation, the illusion formation could also be broken. While these fiends didn’t understand the Dao of Formations, they had brute force and numbers. Just by running around and ramming away, they could increase the burden on Yiyi. It wasn’t long before Yiyi felt her spiritual energy rapidly falling, and she knew that she couldn’t hold the fiends for very long.
Her little face paled as she shouted, “Bao’er, come back!”
The little tiger roared in reluctance, but he quickly retreated. As he retreated, the white fog began to disperse. Upon seeing a vague silhouette, at least seven of the fiends lunged at Yiyi. One of them, a civet, was as fast as lightning, instantly lunging up to Yiyi and swiping its claws.
But what awaited it was a flick of Yiyi’s small hand.
Her fair and tender wrist wore a bracelet of scarlet jade.
The Blazeraven Ring!
Tang Jie had given this treasure to Yiyi for her to use.
Without these hidden cards, how could he possibly let Yiyi and the little tiger go and deal with twenty-some fiends?
Boom!
Though the civet was agile and swift, it couldn’t avoid such a close-range attack. Hundreds of Blazeravens poured out of the ring and smashed into the civet’s body, instantly obliterating it. Fire leapt into the sky as several dozen pieces of charred civet flesh rained down.
Yiyi muttered, “It’s so charred that it’s basically worthless. What a pity.”
She had spent long enough with Tang Jie that she had picked up his way of speaking somewhat.
Meanwhile, more fiends charged.
Yiyi waved her hand.
The forgotten petals once more reminded the fiend pack that they existed.
As they danced, they linked together in a chain and flew toward Yiyi, forming a barrier in front of her.
The Blossom Shell.
Boom!
A massive boar fiend slammed its two thick, stone-shattering tusks into the Blossom Shell. But all it did was cause a few petals to wither and fly away, leaving Yiyi unharmed.
Yiyi borrowed the force of the impact to float backward, and the boar roared as it gave chase. Suddenly, a small crack opened up in the floral barrier.
A snow-white sword emerged from the crack, aimed right at the boar. The boar mindlessly continued its charge, and plush! The sword penetrated through the boar’s head. A moment later, ice bloomed across the boar, quickly turning it into an ice statue.
The Crystal Ice Sword!
This was none other than the sword that Tang Jie had taken from the slain Frost Fairy. As this sword contained the essence of the Frost Fairy, it was extremely powerful, but its bitterly cold nature made it difficult to use. Yiyi had consumed the Frost Fairy’s sprite core, and though she had not developed an Ice spell art, she had gained some level of ice resistance, which allowed her to barely use the sword. Even so, Tang Jie had had her accustom herself to the sword for two years before allowing her to use it.
The thrust of the sword killed the boar on the spot.
Before Yiyi could pull out the Crystal Ice Sword, an ape with arms that were ten-some meters long yowled and reached out to Yiyi. Its arm extended and struck Yiyi’s shield, forcing her back. Then the arm continued to lengthen, chasing Yiyi down and punching at the Blossom Shell several times in a row.
Kcha! The Blossom Shell exploded into countless motes of pink dust.
At the moment the Blossom Shell disappeared, a blue-eyed rabbit opened its mouth and fired off a blade of ice.
The ice blade wasn’t powerful, but it posed an enormous threat to Yiyi. As the ice blade was about to hit, the little tiger rushed out and blocked the ice blade with his body. He shivered and then turned his head and roared.
The Tiger King Roar caused all the fiends to tremble, and their offensive paused for a moment. Only that Earth Bear was unaffected, roaring as it charged over and swung a paw at the little tiger.
Not even the little tiger could handle the Earth Bear’s prodigious strength, but if he backed away, Yiyi would come under attack. He stared at the black bear, glaring with madness in his eyes as he refused to give ground.
Just when that bear paw was about to hit the little tiger, an arm suddenly shot out and stopped the paw cold.
The Earth Bear froze, and then it saw Yiyi rising up from behind the little tiger, a human-shaped brute beneath her. It was none other than the Grade 3 combat puppet.
Holding the puppet token, Yiyi solemnly pointed. “Go!”
The puppet rumbled out, rushing up to the Earth Bear’s side. It grabbed the Earth Bear’s right shoulder with its left hand and the bear’s chest with its right hand. The Earth Bear instinctively raised its arms to resist, both parties exerting their strength at the same time. The Earth Bear was enormously powerful, one of the strongest among the fiend beasts, but as it flexed its muscles, the puppet’s left arm flashed.
A prodigious strength surged, and then the Earth Bear was thrown into the air with a whoosh. An arm proceeded to grab its leg and smash it into the ground, unleashing a tremendous shockwave.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! The combat puppet repeatedly hammered the bear into the ground. The poor Earth Bear was an upper-grade Spirit Sensing fiend, a domineering existence of its class, but the combat puppet savaged it, snapping its bones and muscles as blood splashed. It tried to counterattack, but a Grade 3 combat puppet was capable of dealing with Mortal Shedding Realm existences, and the work Tang Jie and Wei Tianchong had invested in it raised the quality of this puppet. It was now the equivalent of a Nine Revolutions Mortal Shedding Realm cultivator, in the same class as Gu Changqing. There was no way the Earth Bear could fight back. With one brutal punch, the combat puppet killed it.
The fiends shrieked in fear at the combat puppet’s brutal style of fighting, backing away in fear.
Yiyi was delighted by this, realizing that the method Tang Jie had taught really had been effective.
She had waited until now to use the puppet so that she could deliver a painful blow right when the enemy was at the height of its power.
Tang Jie had ordered her to only release the puppet at the most critical moment, and then to use the cruelest method to kill the strongest fiend. This was guaranteed to give the fiends a massive psychological blow. Even if these fiends hadn’t reached Mind Opening, they still knew to fear for their lives. So long as they sensed that their opponent was more powerful and more terrifying, they would be even more cowardly than humans, and their ranks would crumble.
This was psychological warfare, and a most common tactic used since ancient times for the few to overcome the many. But this was the first time it had been used on fiends.
As the fiends backed away in fear and she was planning to keep scaring the fiends, there was a sudden gust of wind.
As the wind rose, the retreating fiends suddenly raised their heads and howled.
Their eyes turned red, and they began to once more charge at Yiyi.
Yiyi was scared out of her wits. While commanding the puppet to fight back, she shouted, “Big Brother, it’s bad! The fiends are charging instead of running!”
While she was in charge of holding off the enemy outside the formation, the Heart Consonance spell art was still active.
“What’s going on?” Tang Jie’s voice rang out in her mind.
“I don’t know. They were retreating, but then for some reason, they began rushing in again! It’s so annoying!” Yiyi ran around and evaded while commanding the puppet.
“Yiyi, don’t panic and listen to me…” Tang Jie began to give orders to Yiyi.
The panicked Yiyi’s eyes began to brighten as she listened to Tang Jie.
She chuckled, “It’s always Big Brother with the smart ideas!”
The little girl turned around and raised her hand. A flower formation rose up, and the combat puppet and the little tiger fought in the formation. Meanwhile, Yiyi went off in the other direction.
The fiends didn’t pursue when they saw her running. In fact, they even let her circle around the battlefield and get behind them. Her target was Qin Zhou’s group.
These five Green Hill Sect disciples had been carried along by the Fragrant Store Cave fiends after being captured, and they had been thrown to the ground when the fiends had gone to chase after Tang Jie. A curse had sealed their powers, so none of the fiends paid them any mind.
Yiyi flew over to the five, placing her hands on her waist as she said, “Hey, can any of you fight?”
“Yiyi, Yiyi!” Seeing that Yiyi had finally come, Luo Yin excitedly cried out, “Hurry and help your big sister undo this damned curse.”
Yiyi stood on her tiptoes and wagged her head. “Of course, but you also have to help me. These guys are really vicious, and I can’t beat them without Big Brother.”
“It’s a promise!” fatty Chen Yao replied.
“Be careful. This will hurt a little.” Yiyi took out a pearl from her Mustard Seed Bag. This was the Cosmic Breeze Pearl. As for the Mustard Seed Bag, it had formerly belonged to Wanderer Pentavenom.
Holding the pearl in her left hand, she aimed her right hand at the five and pushed. The five of them instantly felt a powerful spiritual pressure on their bodies that made their skin go taut.
This was the inevitable result of undoing a curse through force. Yiyi didn’t know what curse had been used on them, and she wouldn’t be able to undo it even if she did know. Thus, she decided to use the crudest and simplest method. Of course, using force would undoubtedly inflict pain on the victim, but Yiyi didn’t have the luxury of worrying about such things.
But as they were cultivators, they managed to hold out against Yiyi’s force.
The moment they broke free, Zhang Chengyun ran off to the side, clearly having no intention of fighting. Yiyi clapped her hands and laughed. “I knew that you guys couldn’t be trusted.”
A vine surged out of the ground and wrapped around Zhang Chengyun. Before he could break free, it threw him into the fiend horde, forcing him to fight.
Qin Zhou angrily replied, “Don’t say ‘you guys’. That was only him.”
Before Yiyi could do anything, he took out his sword and charged toward the fiends. Zhang Chengyun’s actions left him rather ashamed. Soon after, Luo Yin, Chen Yao, and Ling Jing also threw themselves into the fray.
The entry of these five disciples into the battle instantly turned the tables.
Qin Zhou was a Mortal Shedding Realm cultivator, while the combat puppet was a Mortal Shedding Realm middle-level existence. As for Yiyi, she had the Crystal Ice Sword, Blazeraven Ring, Cosmic Breeze Pearl, and the secret arts of the Divine Firmament Sword Classic, so her combat power was the equivalent of a basic Mortal Shedding Realm cultivator. Together with the little tiger and the four other Green Hill disciples, they managed to push back the twenty fiends.
Finally, with a despairing howl, the last fiend was slain. Qin Zhou and the others swayed and then flopped to the ground.
While they had won, they were all rather tired out. Even Yiyi was sitting on the shoulder of the puppet, shouting, “Tired, tired!” The little tiger was laid out on the ground, his tongue sticking out.
The only one who seemed fine was the puppet. It was forever silent and cold, never making the slightest extraneous action. Only the expended spirit stones in its body that provided it power and motion indicated just how burdensome the battle had been.
Chen Yao looked at the corpses around them and said, “I really didn’t think we would be able to kill this many fiends. There are twenty-some of them, and at least three are upper-grade Spirit Sensing…”
Only then did the Green Hill Sect disciples realize that they had inadvertently pulled off a miracle.
Twenty-some fiends, even if none of them were at Mind Opening, was an unimaginable result for the Green Hill Sect.
Yiyi said in disdain, “Tsk, this is nothing. If Big Brother were here, he would be able to singlehandedly destroy all of them.”
“That’s impossible,” Zhang Chengyun instinctively said.
Qin Zhou grunted, “Shut your mouth. Have you forgotten that there are three Mind Opening and seventy-some lower fiends in that formation?”
Zhang Chengyun shuddered. Only now did he remember that there were many times more terrifying fiends in the formation.
Luo Yin hastily asked, “Yiyi, is Tang Xuan okay?”
Yiyi replied, “Big Brother has almost killed them all, but the Yi Wood Azure Heaven Formation won’t last for much longer.”
Qin Zhou and the others shared a look.
Though they had mentally prepared themselves for it, hearing the results being announced still left them dizzy.
A single student who wasn’t even at Mortal Shedding had killed all the fiends of Fragrant Store Cave?
This was inconceivable!
Even if it had been done with the power of a formation, it was still a nigh impossible mission. If formations were this invincible, why hadn’t anyone else done it?
“Then we’ll go and help him deal with the rest,” Chen Yao immediately said.
Courage always belonged to the victorious side. After hearing about how the battle was going, the fatty immediately volunteered, and even Qin Zhou was tempted. After all, this was more than a hundred fiends. How much money would this be if they were converted to resources? Even a little would be enough. And to get this, they had to show a little effort.
As for the fact that they had been saved again by Tang Jie, Qin Zhou unconsciously ignored it.
At worst, it was just another two pills for one life.
Alas, Yiyi shook her head. “There’s no need. Big Brother says that he doesn’t need your help.”
These were deflating words.
“But…” Yiyi said. “There’s something else he needs your help with.”
“What?” everyone asked in unison.
“Hold on. Let me finish listening to what Big Brother has to say.” The little girl tilted her head as if she was carefully listening. In truth, with Heart Consonance, the voice was transmitted directly to her mind, so there was no point in doing this. She did it more out of habit.
As she listened, her face suddenly lit up.
She raised her head and said, “Big Sister Ling Jing, come here for a moment. Big Brother needs you to do something.”
“What is it?” Ling Jing asked, walking over.
Yiyi replied, “Please… die!”
Whoosh!
The Crystal Ice Sword stabbed into Ling Jing’s belly.