So there really was something wrong with that pill, wasn’t there?
His subordinates were likely already ruined.
Xia Hui said nothing more. Some things were better left hinted at rather than explained clearly.
Wasn’t that so?
……
“Eh? They want us to launch the general offensive early?”
“They say some unplanned circumstances have appeared in the Secret Realm. The Venerables decided to shorten the original process. There’s no need to continue with those probes.”
So they needed to wrap everything up quickly?
The gathered ‘Magic Path’ members stood in a circle, finding the order a bit strange, though they couldn’t pin down why.
“Is it the same for the others?”
“Yes. The main direction of the attack this time is right here. The defense is weakest, and one of the disciples the Venerables value most is stationed here.”
An image appeared in the speaker’s hand, vividly depicting a cute young girl with black hair and colored eyes.
“No one else matters. Our job is to test this child’s mettle!”
All of them attacking together just to test a child? The black-robed men couldn’t help but mutter to themselves. This felt a bit embarrassing.
Bullying a child with superior numbers… it would be shameful to speak of later.
“Most of the puppets we sent earlier were dismantled by this child. Her strength is not to be underestimated. Don’t look down on her.”
One black-robed man who had indirectly clashed with Hua Jian reminded his colleagues to be careful. The central area of the Secret Realm was no longer a place where they could do as they pleased.
Once they entered, their strength would also drop to the Spirit Master level. In a fight, they might not necessarily be a match for Hua Jian.
“Hearing you say that, I think I understand why the Venerables are so focused on her. Fine, then we’ll meet her with our true skills!”
……
The long night passed, and a new day arrived. Hua Jian’s mood didn’t lighten with the appearance of sunlight; instead, she grew increasingly uneasy.
The shadow in the sky seemed to be growing thicker. Whenever she looked at that mass coiling around the pillar of light, an indescribable feeling rose in her heart.
She didn’t know what kind of feeling it was or whether it was good or bad, but she knew that this shadow might have some connection to her and would completely change her current situation.
“Miss Hua Jian, you seem very worried?” Xia Hui squinted, placing a small incense burner beside Hua Jian. A faint, calming fragrance wafted from it, temporarily suppressing the unease in Hua Jian’s heart.
“Yes, I’m a bit worried. That thing in the sky gives me a bad feeling.” Hua Jian nodded, loosening her clothes to let the little spiritual civet poke its head out.
Pinching the civet’s ear, Hua Jian continued, “I don’t think things are that simple. A super genius like me is bound to encounter a life-or-death crisis in a place like this, and then narrowly survive by teaming up with friends.”
“But the current level of crisis is a bit too mild. I suspect there’s something big waiting for me.”
Xia Hui wore an expression of disbelief. She was worried about this?
Not enough of a crisis? For anyone else, this was already a world-ending catastrophe!
“Isn’t it better if the crisis is smaller?”
“A small crisis is fine, of course, but Xia Hui, you have to understand. At my level, it’s impossible to encounter a small crisis. It’s heaven’s will!” Hua Jian pointed at the sky, speaking with absolute seriousness.
‘At my level…’ Xia Hui felt that while everything else about Hua Jian was great, her narcissistic streak really needed some work.
Even within the Magic Path, such arrogant people were a rare minority.
But Hua Jian wasn’t even being arrogant; she was like a superstitious person convinced something big was coming.
The reason being she felt a genius like herself must face big disasters. It was hard to even comment on it.
“Eh, then will I be the person who goes through life and death with Miss Hua Jian?”
Xia Hui chose to play along. ‘You like this kind of stuff? Fine, I’ll act with you and make sure your emotional needs are fully met.’
Hua Jian tilted her head and looked at Xia Hui for a long time before shaking her head calmly.
“No, because I’m not a lolicon.”
“Huh?”
“Cough, I mean, you’re a bit too small. We should just have a pure friendship. As for the person who will share the crisis with me, it should be Linglong.”
Hua Jian considered herself a protagonist, and the other protagonist slot should belong to Linglong.
Normally, when two protagonists met, there would be a fierce rivalry, but their situation was different.
They were likely following the more traditional hero-and-heroine route.
Don’t ask who was the hero and who was the heroine. Between the two of them, was there anyone other than Hua Jian who could even remotely be associated with the word ‘hero’?
“Why her?”
“Because she’s strong and beautiful, and she’s the Saintess of Yaochi. Only she is worthy of a genius like me!”
Xia Hui covered her face with both hands and took two deep breaths. She couldn’t take it; how could Hua Jian behave like this?
She couldn’t even say Hua Jian truly had wicked designs on Linglong; it was more like Hua Jian was just indulging in wishful thinking!
“Miss Hua Jian, there’s something I don’t know if I should say.”
Seeing Xia Hui’s reaction, Hua Jian guessed what she wanted to say.
So, she directly blocked her ears. “Then don’t say it. Anyway, I’m definitely right!”
This bit of stubbornness gave Xia Hui a sense of familiarity. As a future Lady Saintess, it was better if Hua Jian acted a bit more like this.
Linglong wasn’t off-limits, but you couldn’t use a reason like that! At least give a reason like being attracted to her beauty?
“The relationship between Linglong and me is very complex. A kid like you wouldn’t understand,” Hua Jian continued to save her own dignity.
She wanted to say more, but just as she finished that sentence, several aggressive auras suddenly approached from the distance, causing Hua Jian to immediately enter a combat state.
“Those guys are finally here. Xia Hui, leave first and go get people to help!”
Xia Hui glanced into the distance. Before leaving, she gave Hua Jian a lingering reply: “Miss Hua Jian, I am actually older than you.”
Even if she wasn’t a child, she still didn’t understand the relationship between Hua Jian and Linglong.
So, “I’ll go get Miss Linglong for you so the two of you can face the crisis together.”
With that, she kicked off the ground and flew into the distance as a streak of colored light.
‘Since when could Xia Hui fly that fast?’ A flicker of confusion crossed Hua Jian’s mind, but it wasn’t enough to make her doubt Xia Hui’s identity.
Besides, in the time it took to exchange those few words, the Magic Path had already charged into Hua Jian’s field of vision.
The incoming enemies this time seemed a bit… numerous.
It wasn’t exactly ‘covering the mountains and plains,’ but there were definitely many more than the last attack.
Furthermore, the aura radiating from these enemies was different from before; there was a lot of life force.
This meant the Magic Path hadn’t just sent puppets; their actual members had come in force.
“They really think highly of me. But you’re all just at the Spirit Master level; I’m not afraid of you!”
A talisman appeared in her hand, and Hua Jian slammed it onto the ground. In an instant, a dense, colored mist began to swirl around the giant pillar.
She hadn’t just been waiting here idly; she had already made all the necessary preparations.
And besides, she had the treasures she had seized from a certain great young master.
The quantity of spirit items in there was massive—certainly enough to give these enemies a run for their money!
Hua Jian had already taken stock of the items in that storage pouch. The variety and quantity were rare indeed, though the quality wasn’t the best, meaning they couldn’t be used long-term.
After two or three uses, their effectiveness would drop significantly. But did that matter?
With this storage pouch in hand, she could use Spirit Tools as bombs and blast her opponents to death!
Since they were stolen anyway, it would be a waste not to use them. With that thought, Hua Jian pulled out a Spirit Tool and threw it toward the incoming enemies.
What she threw was a Fangtian Halberd twice the height of a person. It was very heavy, and Hua Jian didn’t like such clunky things, so it was the first to go.
As she threw it, she wrapped a vine around the handle, spun it twice to build momentum, and then hurled it with all her might.
The halberd tore through the air, pouncing toward a black-robed cultivator at extreme speed.
Boom!
With a massive explosion, the black-robed cultivator struck by the halberd fell from the air, rolling across the ground in a pathetic state.
“Damn, a Ling King-grade Spirit Tool just thrown out like that… Oh no!”
The black-robed cultivator had barely finished complaining when he noticed the violent spiritual power fluctuations emanating from the halberd lying near him.
Using a Ling King-grade Spirit Tool for self-destruction damage? This completely exceeded his understanding.
What kind of wealthy person played like this!
And he soon realized that self-destructing one Spirit Tool wasn’t the end, but only the beginning.
Every few breaths, Hua Jian would hurl a Spirit Tool roughly at the Ling King level. She used them for one hit and then immediately triggered their self-destruction.
Using this simple and crude method, Hua Jian single-handedly held back the charge of an entire group.
It was truly a case of one person holding the pass against ten thousand.
However, these cultivators weren’t brainless puppets. Upon seeing Hua Jian’s ‘wealthy’ tactics, they immediately scattered so she couldn’t stall many people at once.
While some dealt with the Spirit Tool attacks, more charged into the colored mist, searching for Hua Jian.
The flower fragrance drifting in the Forbidden Land combined with the colored mist created a strange chemical reaction.
It made the fragrance within the mist far more hallucinogenic than usual.
Even these black-robed cultivators, who had already taken poison-dispelling pills, found it difficult to handle for a moment.
Within the colored mist, the first enemies the black-robed cultivators encountered weren’t Hua Jian, but a group of unusually excited cultivators.
They emerged from the mist with loud shouts, waving their weapons at a few isolated black-robed men. They seemed completely unaffected by the mist.
The strength they displayed was terrifying, matching the black-robed men who had been suppressed from the Ling King level. Due to the terrain advantage, they even held a slight edge!
After a few moves, one black-robed cultivator was pierced through the chest by a sword. Bright red blood gushed from the wound, and the pungent smell of iron only served to heighten the combat lust of the frenzied cultivators.
The heavily injured black-robed man slumped to the ground. In a moment when no one was watching, his expression went blank, as if he had become a soulless puppet.
If someone were to dissect the body right now, they would discover it really was just a puppet—one that looked exactly like the man.
Its purpose was, of course, to create a terrifying battlefield atmosphere.
A battlefield with blood and corpses was what a real battlefield should look like, wasn’t it?
As for whether anyone would notice the anomaly… it was very unlikely. Such corpses would quickly break down into a pile of mangled flesh on the ground. No one would ever know the secret.
Just like these frenzied cultivators fighting for their lives, none of them noticed the oddity.
Hua Jian was a bit surprised by the combat power of these guys.
She hadn’t expected them to be so strong, as if their Ling King level power was being forcefully squeezed through the array’s limits.
But she soon had no energy to think about the reason, as she had to move to stop the black-robed cultivators from attacking the giant pillar.
The black-robed men’s choice was clever. They didn’t bother trying to find Hua Jian in the mist; they went straight for the center, where the thing she had to protect was located.
As long as they attacked that spot, Hua Jian would have to return and save it.
It went exactly as they expected. Hua Jian was forced to show her true self, though the sight of her was a bit shocking.
The little spiritual civet jumping in and out of the mist to stage sneak attacks wasn’t hard to deal with; their strength was more than enough for that.
But when a Hua Jian with ‘Three Heads and Six Arms’ burst out of the mist, wielding several Ling King-grade Spirit Tools to brawl with them, the black-robed cultivators couldn’t help but curse.
Hua Jian’s vines were even more flexible than her hands, so it was only natural she used them to wield Spirit Tools, wasn’t it?
And since Hua Jian currently had no shortage of powerful Spirit Tools, it was a perfect match!
‘Hey, let’s see you handle a weapon master!’
In truth, Hua Jian’s skill with weapons was only average, but she made up for it with sheer quantity. Facing her onslaught, one pair of hands against so many… how could they win?
When fighting Hua Jian, the black-robed cultivators didn’t feel like they were dueling one person, but rather being lynched by a mob.
Not only was the frontal battle like this, but extremely fast hidden weapons were periodically fired from within the mist.
Although the damage wasn’t high, the black-robed men still had to stay focused to deal with them.
Who knew if the next hidden weapon would be something lethal?
The black-robed cultivators who heard the sounds of battle gradually gathered. After seeing this incredible scene, they all let out a sigh of admiration.
The contrast in this girl’s fighting style was just too stark.
In reality, they could have started dismantling the array near the stone pillar now; no matter how strong Hua Jian was, she could only stall a few people.
But… who told them their mission this time was to test Hua Jian’s limits?