Li Yan flew rapidly through the multicolored space, a sense of exhilaration filling him.
With his Divine Sense, which was comparable to that of an early-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator, he could vaguely sense three or four bands of light dancing about fifty li away to his side. The space was a kaleidoscope of colors, with no sun, moon, or stars in the sky to give any sense of direction. Li Yan relied solely on his intuition. He had sensed one or two bands of light in the other directions, so he immediately chose the area where he sensed the most, as it would give him a greater chance of finding Baili Yuan's group.
As Li Yan rapidly approached, the bands of light became clearer in his Divine Sense. Among them, he was startled to find a purple one. This purple band was currently some distance from the other four, which made Li Yan heave a sigh of relief. With a flash of spiritual light, he shot like a bolt of lightning toward the purple band of light.
Gan Shi was leading four others, trudging arduously along the peak of a boundless snowy mountain. A cold wind howled, and the landscape was a vast expanse of white snow. The sunlight reflecting off it seemed to only intensify the chill.
This was an endless, snowy path that snaked along the ridge of the mountain. There was no cover anywhere. Looking down from the sky, one would only see a few black dots moving slowly along the reflective snowy path on the vast, continuous mountain ridge.
Gan Shi's face was somewhat sallow. He walked at the front, constantly forming hand seals, sending out spiritual energy diagrams—some round, some square, some irregular—into the surroundings and the sky, shielding the five of them in the middle. This was his renowned technique: Formations manifesting with every art, using formations to defend against the enemy.
On the snowy slopes of the ridges on both sides, illusory faces would occasionally emerge from the ground. These faces were like the vibrant, blood-red faces of infants. They emitted whimpering, mournful cries, and their eyes glowed with a strange yellow light. After materializing, they would pounce on the group, their small mouths opening to reveal teeth that seemed to be dripping with blood as they tried to bite the five cultivators.
However, the moment these terrifying infant faces got close to Gan Shi's group of four, they would be blocked by the hand seals Gan Shi cast. The various infant faces on them showed expressions of fury. Every time they opened their mouths to bite, they would be torn apart by an invisible shredding force. Amidst shrill screams, they would spin and merge into the seemingly pure and innocent sky. The next moment, even more infant faces, filled with resentment and anger, would rise from the snow, crying and screaming as they lunged forward, seemingly endless and boundlessly chilling.
At this moment, Gan Shi's group was clearly in a terrible state. Besides his sallow complexion, there was a shocking, bloody hole in his right leg. Although it had been simply bandaged, his movements still caused it to drag through the snow, and from time to time, fresh blood would drip out, seep through his trouser leg, and then drip from the cuff onto the snowy mountain path. It left a trail of dotted bloodstains on the peak of the mountain ridge. Clearly, his trousers were saturated and could not absorb another drop of blood.
The four people behind him were moving even more slowly and with great difficulty. Two of them were supporting the other two. The two being supported were clearly gravely injured, practically half-lying on the others. Every step they took seemed to be an immense struggle. If not for Gan Shi protecting them, these four would have likely been devoured long ago by the ghoulish infants from the snow pillars.
"Martial Uncle Gan, you should go on your own! If this continues, we'll all die together." One of the two Qi Condensation disciples providing support glanced at his companion, then at the two who could no longer walk on their own. Under normal circumstances, supporting one person, let alone using an art to envelop five or six, would be an effortless task. But at this moment, these two were physically exhausted, and even moving on their own was a struggle.
These four Qi Condensation cultivators—three men and one woman—were all young cultivators around the age of twenty. Judging by their attire, the ones who still had some fighting strength were a man and a woman. The male cultivator was a disciple of Lord Lao Peak. He had ordinary looks and a stocky build, but his face was currently an unhealthy, flushed red. The woman was from the same peak as Gan Shi, a disciple of Four Symbols Peak. She was petite with a refined and beautiful appearance. Despite the cold wind, her face was covered in sweat. She was supporting a fellow disciple from Lord Lao Peak, who was in a semi-conscious state. The other heavily injured person was a disciple from Never-Parting Peak, leaning on the stocky man, completely devoid of combat ability. The three of them looked at the tall figure ahead, dragging one leg as he walked, then at the crimson infant faces sprouting from the snow like mushrooms after a rain—like a pack of hungry, vicious ghosts from the underworld. A trace of despair appeared in their eyes. After exchanging a look of mutual understanding, the female cultivator spoke softly.
The yellow-haired man up ahead did not turn back upon hearing her words. He continued to move forward with difficulty, his voice low and firm. "Nonsense! What kind of person do you take me for? To abandon my juniors and flee alone? Don't mention this again. Otherwise, watch out, or I'll slap you."
Gan Shi growled as he rapidly cast several more hand seals. After he spoke, besides the female cultivator whose face turned red, the other two conscious disciples could only manage a bitter smile. On this journey, they had long since experienced this Martial Uncle Gan's temper. It was just that at this rate, they would likely all be dead within a few more li.
At this moment, Gan Shi was furious to the extreme, his anger surging to the heavens. 'It seems there's no getting out this time. If I can get out, I will definitely seek justice from the Ten-Pace Courtyard and the Pure Land Sect. Even if it costs me my life, I must kill a few more disciples from those two sects in the outside world.'
Since entering the Wheel of Life and Death, Gan Shi's group had suffered casualties in the first two trials, but they had managed to push through. In the first trial, they encountered a full-strength demonic beast team. After losing two of their own, Gan Shi relied on his powerful formations to trap the enemy in a very short time, and then the remaining cultivators unleashed a hundred different poisons, ultimately clearing the trial successfully.
In the second trial, they met a team of twenty remaining monks from the Pure Land Sect, led by Chan Monk Zhiwei. The battle was extremely brutal. In the end, Gan Shi, having used all his formations, killed Zhiwei's group at the cost of five dead and seven wounded, but he himself was also seriously injured.
But it was the third trial that nearly wiped them out. After several intense battles, they adopted the same strategy as Li Yan's group, arriving at the yellow sphere early to set up formations and deadly poisons. What they didn't expect was that the enemy would be so fast. They were only halfway through setting up their formations when Liang Liang from the Ten-Pace Courtyard led his people into the sphere. The battle erupted in an instant. To Gan Shi's alarm, there were over twenty additional Pure Land Sect monks among the enemy's Qi Condensation cultivators. The personnel ratio was severely unbalanced. Fortunately, their formations were mostly complete. In their shock, they relied on the formations and various poisons to hold their ground, barely managing to fight to a draw. Gan Shi suppressed his injuries and fought with a life-for-a-life recklessness, no longer caring if the dark shadow was approaching outside. He unleashed all his magical power and formations. Formations manifested with every art, and arts manifested with every formation, killing enemies in an instant. At that moment, his mastery of formation group attacks was on full display, and the enemy Qi Condensation cultivators fell into his traps one after another. Liang Liang could do nothing about him. But the power of a Sword Cultivator was terrifying. When he also targeted the Malevolent Spirit Sect's Qi Condensation cultivators, their casualties quickly mounted. Even with the cover of the formations, the difference in strength was too great, and after a few exchanges, the Malevolent Spirit Sect had lost several people.
Gan Shi had no choice but to abandon his group attacks and focus on Liang Liang. During their entanglement, the traps the Malevolent Spirit Sect had laid out earlier slowly began to take effect. Liang Liang was afflicted by several poisons that began to activate, and he was ultimately killed by Gan Shi.
Just as Gan Shi was about to go all out and annihilate the rest of the enemy group, the wall of the sphere behind him rippled, and a Chan Master broke through to launch a sneak attack. A staff swung horizontally at the back of his head. In the crisis, Gan Shi couldn't dodge in time, and the tip of the staff pierced straight through his right leg, sending him flying into the air. This person was Chan Master Zhiliao. His face was savage, like a demonic tiger. Gan Shi, having already expended a great deal of his magical power, was no match for him.
In the few breaths it took for him to evade, Chan Master Zhiliao had killed several more Malevolent Spirit Sect disciples. Gan Shi was enraged. A fierce glint flashed in his eyes, and he took out a pill and swallowed it. His magical power was instantly restored by several tenths. After forcefully gathering his power, he engaged in battle once more. At this point, the entire sphere was filled with poisonous gas. Although Chan Master Zhiliao had held his breath, against Gan Shi's life-for-a-life fighting style—where his body became a formation, where formations manifested with every art, where large formations concealed small formations, and small formations concealed sub-formations in an endless stream—he was hard-pressed. Chan Master Zhiliao knew, of course, that Gan Shi must have swallowed some kind of potential-stimulating pill and wouldn't last long. Once the pill's effects wore off, he would be at his mercy.
But he had still underestimated Gan Shi. Gan Shi had been immersed in the way of formations for decades; his very life was fused with them. His every word and action was a formation. In a retreat, Zhiliao took one step and fell into an interlocking trap formation that Gan Shi had secretly laid. By the time he realized it, it was too late. He could only use all his strength to try and break free. But this formation was one that Gan Shi had set up at the cost of swallowing a pill to stimulate his potential. Inside, talismans intertwined and spiritual power surged.
Chan Master Zhiliao was truly formidable. Even under Gan Shi's frenzied assault, he managed to defend himself while casting arts to escape. However, he emerged with a flushed face, his magical power greatly diminished. At this point, he would suffocate if he didn't take a breath. In his urgency, he took a small breath. It was this single breath that Gan Shi had calculated for. He knew that formations alone could not kill this Chan Master who was at the same realm as himself. With the surrounding air saturated with deadly poison, he had laid out a ultimate, life-saving poison outside the formation.
Poor Chan Master Zhiliao. Despite his outstanding magical power, he ultimately fell into the trap. After resisting for a few more breaths, his life force dissipated, and Gan Shi seized the opportunity to kill him with a palm strike.
But now, the entire yellow sphere was littered with corpses. Apart from Gan Shi, only six people from the Malevolent Spirit Sect remained: two lightly injured and four heavily injured. Gan Shi himself was exhausted and had collapsed.
In the end, it was the two lightly injured disciples who fed Gan Shi a pill, allowing him to recover a little. Looking at the bodies on the ground, Gan Shi and the other six survivors walked out of the yellow sphere, their hearts filled with grief and indignation. Because the battle had been a stalemate, the vast majority of the enemy had self-destructed their Storage Pouches before dying. This included the two Foundation Establishment cultivators, who destroyed their Spirit-Storing Pouches as well. Gan Shi did not obtain many medicinal pills from the enemy.
This put them in a tight spot for pills. Gan Shi's Spirit-Storing Pouch still held six heavily injured people from the first two trials, and many pills had already been used on them. Now, with four more heavily injured, the pill supply was stretched even thinner. And the most terrifying part was that he hadn't been able to get any Spirit-Storing Pouches from the enemy. His own Spirit-Storing Pouch could only hold eight people. After providing some treatment, he left the two more lucid, heavily injured disciples outside and placed the two unconscious ones into his Spirit-Storing Pouch. Gan Shi and the remaining four rested for a bit before setting foot on the snowy mountain ridge.
At this point, Gan Shi's internal and external injuries were already very severe. Nearly half an hour had passed, yet they had only covered half the distance.
The few disciples behind him had spoken very little since leaving the yellow sphere. Their faces were filled with confusion and despair, not understanding why the enemy had so many cultivators.
"Martial Uncle, this trap was truly despicable," the stocky disciple from Lord Lao Peak couldn't help but say as he walked slowly. His heart was filled with frustration. He knew they wouldn't make it out this time. He just hoped they could hold on until they reached the yellow sphere, so they could take a few more enemies down with them before they died.
His yellow hair flew in the cold wind, Gan Shi's eyes fixed firmly on the path ahead. "Heh heh, my Malevolent Spirit Sect truly miscalculated this time. But I intend to make them pay a heavy price for it."
At the same time, he thought to himself, 'Baili, Junior Sister Gong, you must make it out.'