Bao Gu hurried back to the village and found Yu Mi.
“We’re surrounded,” she said. “They’re not the Heavenly Demon Dragon Riders. Looks like they’re from the one hundred and eight tribes of Hidden Dragon Abyss—saw weasels, jackals, and softshell turtles…”
Yu Mi stared at her in disbelief.
“Since when do four-legged land beasts and water-dwellers hang out together?”
Bao Gu was speechless.
“How would I know anything about Hidden Dragon Abyss?”
Yu Mi focused for a moment, then said, “They’re encircling us without attacking. They’re trying to take us alive.”
“That’s not it,” Bao Gu replied. “They’ve taken a fancy to Holy Aunt’s formation flags. They’re afraid a full-on assault will blow the flags apart.”
“…”
Yu Mi couldn’t help wondering if they were brain-damaged or just dirt poor and crazy for treasure.
Bao Gu said, “Senior Sister, we have to hit them while they’re off guard and break out. I’ll break the Heaven-Shrouding Grand Formation they used to lock this place down. You lead the army and wipe them out.”
Did they really think there were only three of them here?
The enemy was confident because they had ten thousand troops, but when Bao Gu came, she’d brought over thirty thousand, nearly forty thousand soldiers. Even with the Soul Chasing Pavillion master having taken ten thousand assassins away, they still held an overwhelming numerical advantage.
Yu Mi faintly felt something was off. She thought for a bit, then said, “I don’t think we should reveal we brought an army just yet. Can you keep them all trapped inside the Heaven-Shrouding Formation so they can’t see anything, then we slaughter them in the dark?”
Bao Gu didn’t care what method they used as long as the enemy died and they could get out. She followed her senior sister’s lead.
“I’ll go set up the array now. Senior Sister, you get ready for battle. How many people do you need?”
“For a silent assassination, the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins are best,” Yu Mi said. “Give me five thousand. That’s enough.”
Bao Gu thought for a moment.
“Our whereabouts are exposed, and news spreads fast in the cultivation world. To avoid trouble dragging on, we need a quick battle and a clean finish. To be safe, give her ten thousand Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins.”
Yu Mi nodded.
“That works too.”
Bao Gu shifted ten thousand Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins out from the Xuantian Mountains and handed them over to Yu Mi. Then she activated a qi-concealing treasure and slipped soundlessly into the Heaven-Shrouding Formation.
Yu Mi wasn’t exactly a formation master, but she had formation diagrams now.
Back when she and Bao Gu were hiding from the world, Bao Gu’s study had stacks upon stacks of formation diagrams and bundles of formation flags—now all sitting inside Yu Mi’s storage bracelet.
She rummaged inside and pulled out the diagram for the Heaven-Shrouding Formation. Following the layout indicated on the diagram, she planned out routes of advance and retreat, designated battle zones, and assigned the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins to their positions.
Five thousand Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins gathered in the tiny village, yet there wasn’t a sound. It was so quiet it was as if they didn’t exist at all.
Yu Mi had no doubt that if she wasn’t paying close attention, even if she flew directly overhead, she wouldn’t notice the presence of those five thousand men.
The Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins stood in the darkness, melted into it, their auras blending seamlessly with their surroundings. It was as if they were transparent, not even there. Never mind their combat abilities for the moment—just the fact that this tiny mountain village could barely hold five thousand people, yet still gave off the eerie illusion of being completely empty, was terrifying.
She gave a single order.
“Don’t chase routed enemies. Anyone who escapes the Heaven-Shrouding Formation is to be left alone. But inside the formation, don’t let a single one live.”
That was what she said, but remembering that Bao Gu had tampered with the formation, she seriously doubted whether any of the ten thousand Hidden Dragon Abyss troops could actually escape.
Yu Mi gave the order.
“Kill.”
She didn’t sense the slightest movement nearby. Her brows furrowed.
“Why aren’t you moving?”
No one answered.
She focused her senses—and realized there were no shadows around her at all.
All five thousand Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins had vanished without a sound, without so much as a farewell. Not a trace left.
It made Yu Mi wonder if everything just now had been her own hallucination, if she’d been performing a one-woman play from start to finish.
A chill rose in her heart.
Could it be her damaged soul hadn’t slowly healed, but had actually gotten worse? Was she starting to hallucinate?
That shouldn’t be possible.
She slapped her own cheeks lightly and muttered under her breath, “Calm down, calm down. That wasn’t a hallucination just now. With my Soul Transformation–stage soul, even cut in half it’s still far beyond a mortal’s. How could I be hallucinating?”
She pulled her emotions back under control and slipped into the Heaven-Shrouding Formation.
Saying Yu Mi “wasn’t proficient with formations” only held if you were comparing her to Bao Gu. She’d lived with Bao Gu for so many years, steeped in it day and night, and had picked up quite a lot. Her accomplishments in formations were not low.
This Heaven-Shrouding Grand Formation sounded impressive, but in truth, it was just a very ordinary array that cut off spiritual senses and blocked vision. Severing spiritual perception so divine sense couldn’t probe, and obscuring sight—there were countless ways to do that. Turning everything into pitch-black like this was actually one of the worst methods.
If not for the urgency of the situation, give her a little time and she could have cracked it herself. Concealment arrays were what she used most often. She was practically a master of them.
She’d been out fighting for years, spending every day on the run. Whenever she needed to rest, she relied on formations to hide herself. This so-called “Heaven-Shrouding Grand Formation” was, in her eyes, nothing more than the lowest-grade array for cutting off spiritual sense and obscuring vision.
If you wanted real concealment, you had to be able to stand right under your enemy’s nose without them seeing or sensing you at all. Then it was a success.
What use was it making everything black? It’s not like anyone here was deaf. Once you reached Nascent Soul and above, who couldn’t locate a target by sound alone? Even if divine sense couldn’t extend outward, people like them who’d tempered themselves on the edge of life and death had a terrifying sensitivity to living auras and environmental changes.
A huge demon standing there, heartbeat pounding, life aura blazing away, was practically a lighthouse in the dark. Add to that the secret methods of contact between Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins, and they could chop down ten thousand targets without hitting a single comrade by mistake.
Yu Mi had nothing but contempt for that demon cultivator who set up this Heaven-Shrouding Formation to deal with Bao Gu.
If that demon had rolled up his sleeves and fought Bao Gu head-on, she could at least have said, “I respect you.” But trying to compete in formations with Bao Gu? That was just begging to be abused.
She dared say, if Bao Gu weren’t so cautious—afraid of news getting out and the Heavenly Demon Dragon Riders of Hidden Dragon Abyss blocking them here—just give Bao Gu a bit of time and she alone could have killed all ten thousand of them inside the formation.
Yu Mi charged into the Heaven-Shrouding Formation, only to find it utterly silent inside.
Dead silent.
If not for the thick stench of blood in the air proving a battle had just taken place, she would have suspected her damaged soul had scrambled her brains.
Darkness was a terrible feeling—especially in a place shrouded in both darkness and blood. It tugged at the most fragile corners of one’s heart.
Darkness, blood, boundless deathly stillness—it made people too afraid to take a step, terrified that a single misstep would plunge them into an abyss. Yet if they stood still, they couldn’t see any path forward either, lost and helpless.
Yu Mi took a deep breath, steadied her emotions, and carefully recalled the formation paths of the Heaven-Shrouding Grand Formation. She might look down on the array, but it was indeed different from concealment formations. If you didn’t follow the proper method, one wrong step and you could get lost in the dark, circling endlessly—a phenomenon people called “running into ghost walls.”
She moved forward through the darkness. She didn’t see a single corpse; only the scent of blood kept growing stronger.
She knew this was the work of Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins. After killing the demon cultivators, they’d taken the bodies as well.
A Nascent Soul–stage demon cultivator was a treasure trove. Their flesh was a powerful tonic; the rest of their body could all be turned into refining materials. Killing a single demon cultivator was like earning a small fortune. There was no way Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins would pass up that kind of opportunity.
But after walking for so long in the dark—her speed was nothing to scoff at—she still hadn’t run into a single Soul Chasing Pavillion assassin or demon cultivator. It was hard not to feel uneasy.
Could the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins have been ambushed?
It was possible: the assassins killed, and their bodies dragged off by the Hidden Dragon Abyss demons.
The more she thought about it, the more Yu Mi’s heart tightened. She pushed forward a bit farther, yet still didn’t see a single Soul Chasing Pavillion assassin.
Her anxiety deepened—especially for Bao Gu, who always reacted two beats slow to danger.
She took a deep breath and called out, “Bao Gu…”
The sound that came out of her throat had a tremor in it, betraying her fear.
By now Bao Gu had already finished altering the grand formation.
She watched as the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins hacked away like they were chopping vegetables, randomly cutting down the Hidden Dragon Abyss demon cultivators until there were almost none left. The “elder,” who was in human form but had the unmistakable features of an old turtle, was still slowly, painstakingly working at breaking the array.
Bao Gu couldn’t help finding it funny. She walked right up to the old turtle with a grin.
“Elder, are you trying to compete in formations with me?”
The “elder” jolted violently at her sudden appearance, limbs flailing, eyes bulging.
“Aren’t you trapped in my Heaven-Shrouding Formation? How are you here?!”
Bao Gu almost laughed and cried at the same time.
“How did Hidden Dragon Abyss end up sending you?” she asked.
The Heaven-Sealing Extermination Grand Formation that sealed that ba hadn’t been able to hold her, and this little Heaven-Shrouding Formation was supposed to trap her?
Was this “elder” here to do a comedy routine?
“Elder, you take your time breaking the formation. I won’t disturb you. Farewell.”
The “elder” saw her suddenly appear and just as suddenly vanish again, and shrieked in terror, “Someone come! The cleaver-wielding lord has escaped—”
Bao Gu ignored his screaming.
But the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins didn’t.
Thanks to that “elder’s” Heaven-Shrouding Formation, the demon cultivators garrisoned in the Heaven-Sealing Formation had no idea Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins were creeping up under cover of darkness. Their heads were taken before they could even react.
Ten thousand demon cultivators of wildly varying strength were wiped out in total silence.
A cold flash swept across the old turtle’s long extended neck. As a column of blood spurted up, a storage treasure flashed—and his severed head and body, which hadn’t even had time to revert to true form, were collected and taken away.
Bao Gu had just rushed out when she heard Yu Mi’s trembling shout. Her heart clenched. She sped toward the source of the sound, but saw no sign of Yu Mi.
“Senior Sister—” she called.
A short distance away, another voice answered.
“Bao Gu?”
It was Yu Mi.
Bao Gu’s mind moved. She used her Void-Stealth Escape Art and slipped toward the sound. Very quickly, she reached the edge of the Heaven-Shrouding Formation.
The moment she revealed herself, she sensed a familiar presence appear right in front of her. That familiar aura melted away the tension in her heart, and she showed a soft smile.
Yu Mi saw Bao Gu and felt the great stone hanging over her heart finally drop. Her fear vanished in an instant.
She lowered her voice.
“I thought you’d been ambushed and something happened to you.”
As she spoke, she grabbed Bao Gu’s hand and led her to the section of the Heaven-Shrouding Formation closest to the edge. Pointing outside, she said, “Look. What happened to the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins? I didn’t see a single one of them. All I can smell is blood.”
“Soul Chasing Pavillion barely took any losses,” Bao Gu said. “The demon cultivators are almost all dead.”
Inside the Heaven-Shrouding Formation, the Soul Chasing Pavillion assassins had absolute advantage. Killing those demon cultivators—some of whom were only at Foundation Establishment or even lower, dragged in to make up numbers—was a breeze.
That was what she said with her mouth, but her expression had grown grave.
Because outside the Heaven-Shrouding Formation, elite troops from Hidden Dragon Abyss were pouring out of the void in a steady stream, methodically tightening their encirclement around the small mountain village.
As the armored elites with weapons in hand moved in formation, battle ships silently unfolded into position. Bao Gu couldn’t see the full layout of all the ships, but from the placement of the dozen or so warships in front of her, she could tell at a glance they were constructing a sealing formation.
Once the array was completed, the entire mountain village would be locked inside a seal. She wouldn’t even be able to use a domain gate. And because it was a warship-based formation, it would be incredibly sturdy and hard to break. Once it was in place, they’d be trapped here even if they grew wings.
She grabbed Yu Mi’s hand.
“Go. We’re leaving right now.”
