21: Chapter 21 The Storm Resolved, Su Qinghan's Predicament

Outer Sect Herb Garden.

Boom!

The Formation light barrier of the Outer Sect Herb Garden violently shook as Song Que descended murderously with several elites from the Law Enforcement Hall.

"Qi Yang! Get the hell out here and face your death!"

Song Que's eyes were blood-red, and his Early Foundation Establishment aura poured down.

Qi Yang stumbled out of the thatched cottage with a pale face, suddenly spitting out a large mouthful of fresh blood—which he had naturally forced out by biting the tip of his tongue—before collapsing limply beside the stone table.

"Elder Song... what crime has this old man committed to make you fly into such a rage?!"

Qi Yang's voice was hoarse and his face was full of terror, yet a trace of a sneer was hidden within those turbid eyes.

"You still dare play dumb? That wretched booklet you gave Liu Qing is simply a heretic art that reverses the Five Elements! It caused this old man's Grade 2 herb field to explode. Today, this old man will definitely strip your soul and refine your Physique!"

Song Que raised his hand, and a sharp streak of Spiritual Qi was about to smash down.

"Stop!"

A furious roar exploded like thunder.

Great Elder Li Changyuan transformed into a streak of purple light, crashing down into the center of the Outer Sect Herb Garden, and with a wave of his large sleeves, he directly neutralized Song Que's attack.

Great Elder Li Changyuan's face turned ashen.

This Special Grade Herb Garden was a benchmark he had personally set up, and for Song Que to lead people to force their way in was simply rubbing his face into the ground and stepping on it!

"Song Que! As a dignified inner Sect Elder, what kind of authority are you trying to throw around in this old man's Outer Sect Herb Garden?!"

Great Elder Li Changyuan glared fiercely.

Although he was also at Early Foundation Establishment, he had a life-and-death sworn brother who was a powerful inner Sect Elder at the Late Stage of Foundation Establishment, so he was not afraid of Song Que at all.

Song Que gnashed his teeth and threw the wretched booklet to Great Elder Li Changyuan.

"Senior Brother Li, take a look at the good deed this old fellow has done! He used this fake secret technique to destroy an entire patch of Grade 2 herb fields on Baicao Peak!"

Great Elder Li Changyuan took the booklet, glanced at it twice, furrowed his brows deeply, and turned to look at Qi Yang.

"Qi Yang, what on earth is going on here?"

Qi Yang prostrated himself on the ground, coughing violently while crying out in grievance: "Grand Elder, please discern the truth! Every single insight in this booklet is true; this old man relied on this to grow top-quality Spirit Medicine! When Lord Liu Qing came to demand it, how could this old man dare not give it?"

"Nonsense! When this old man personally executed it, the Five Elements were thrown into chaos, and the cauldron exploded on the spot!"

Song Que roared.

Qi Yang raised his head, revealing an expression that was both suddenly enlightened and helpless.

"Elder Song, you... what is your Spiritual Root?"

"This old man has a Three-element Profound Spiritual Root!"

Song Que said proudly.

"That explains it!"

Qi Yang fiercely slapped his thigh and cried out with deep heartache: "This old man wrote it extremely clearly in the booklet: this method requires the Five Elements to be complete, using the Meridians as a bridge to form a grand cycle!"

"This old man is the trashiest Five-Element Mixed Spiritual Root in the Cultivation World. Although absorbing Spiritual Qi is as slow as a crawling turtle, the Five Elements of gold, wood, water, fire, and earth within my body are balanced, allowing it to act precisely as a perfect filtering sieve!"

Qi Yang pointed at Song Que, his voice trembling yet his logic clear.

"You possess a Three-element Profound Spiritual Root, lacking two elements in your body! Forcibly operating the mutual generation and restriction of the Five Elements is just like a three-legged table stubbornly trying to bear a thousand-jin boulder. With the Five Elements out of balance, how could the cauldron not explode?!"

As soon as these words were spoken, the entire area fell into a dead silence.

Great Elder Li Changyuan was stunned.

Song Que was also stunned.

Common sense of the Cultivation World collided wildly in their minds.

That's right! Although the Five-Element Mixed Spiritual Root was universally acknowledged as Trash, its greatest characteristic was the balance of the Five Elements!

A Genius's Spiritual Root was pure, often having only two or three elements, making it completely impossible to achieve a Five Element cycle!

"Grand Elder! This method of this old man is simply a clumsy trick exclusively for Trash Physiques like ours! The better the Spiritual Root, the heavier the backlash. This old man is wronged!"

Great Elder Li Changyuan suddenly came to a realization, and then his gaze toward Song Que was filled with disdain and mockery.

"Song Que, did you hear and understand?"

Great Elder Li Changyuan sneered repeatedly.

"You were insatiable in your greed, running over to snatch a piece of farming secret technique from a piece of Trash, and ended up suffering a backlash because your Spiritual Root was too good. Now you still have the face to come to my Outer Sect to arrest someone?"

"You!"

Song Que trembled with anger, pointing at Qi Yang, yet he could not refute a single word.

Qi Yang's words were logically rigorous and flawless!

"Get back to your Baicao Peak! If you dare step foot into my Outer Sect Herb Garden for even half a step more, this old man will definitely report this to the Sect Master and punish you for the crime of exceeding your authority!"

Great Elder Li Changyuan waved his large sleeves, issuing an order to see guests out.

Song Que's face turned alternating shades of green and white. In the end, he could only glare resentfully at Qi Yang before leaving crestfallen with his men.

A storm was resolved without a drop of blood being shed.

Great Elder Li Changyuan pacified Qi Yang with a few words and also turned to leave.

After this campaign, Qi Yang's Five Elements Watering Method completely became a tasteless chicken rib.

Everyone knew that it was a suicide secret technique exclusive to the Five-Element Mixed Spiritual Root, and no one would ever harbor designs on him again.

Qi Yang slowly climbed up, wiped away the blood at the corner of his mouth, and patted the dust off his body.

"So what if your Spiritual Root is good? If your brain is no good, you'll still be played to death."

The Special Grade Herb Garden returned to peace once more.

Time passed like a white horse galloping past a crevice; in the blink of an eye, another two months passed.

Inside the West Wing Room, Su Qinghan's body was surging with Spiritual Qi as she slowly opened her eyes.

Her cultivation Realm had completely stabilized at the Qi Condensation Seventh Layer. Relying on her talent with the Three-element Profound Spiritual Root, her combat power was even sufficient to contend against ordinary Qi Condensation Seventh Layer Peak Realms.

But at this moment, her exquisitely beautiful face did not have a shred of joy; instead, it was covered in gloom.

On the stone table lay a blood-red Sect Jade Slip.

Compulsory mission: head to the edge of the Myriad Monster Mountain Range to gather ten stalks of Grade 2 Spirit Medicine, Snake Saliva Herb.

"Myriad Monster Mountain Range..."

Su Qinghan bit her lips fiercely, her fingernails sinking into her palms.

"Those old fellows of the Luoxia Sect ultimately still refuse to let me go."

She was all too clear about the trickery behind this mission.

Although Snake Saliva Herb was precious, there was fundamentally no need to compulsorily assign her to gather it.

This was definitely an extension of the internal power struggle within the Luoxia Sect. As the daughter of the former Sect Master, even though she had been discarded and thrown to the Xuantian Sect, those usurpers still felt that she was a hidden danger.

This was borrowing a knife to kill someone, leaving her outside the Sect forever!

But it was a compulsory Sect mission; not accepting it meant betraying the Sect, and the Law Enforcement Hall would immediately execute her on the spot.

She had no way out.

The night was deep.

Just like usual, Qi Yang was slowly organizing dead branches and withered leaves in the courtyard.

He looked senile and dim-sighted, but his powerful perception at the Qi Condensation 5th Layer covered a radius of ten zhang like a spiderweb.

Suddenly, his movements paused slightly.

In a dense forest a few hundred meters outside the Outer Sect Herb Garden, two faint fluctuations of Spiritual Qi drifted over.

Qi Yang immediately held his breath, condensing his perception into a single thread and silently probing over.

In the dense forest, a fat man wearing the attire of an outer Sect deacon of the Xuantian Sect was lowering his voice and conversing with a mysterious person entirely enveloped in a black robe.

"The Luoxia Sect side is paying a huge price to buy Su Qinghan's life."

The fat deacon's voice was chilly.

"That b*tch will set out early tomorrow morning for the Myriad Monster Mountain Range, and I have already planned out the route for you."

The black-robed person let out a hoarse sneer: "Rest assured, our Black Blood Hall never fails in what we do. This time, we have dispatched two Qi Condensation Seventh Layer Cultivators, plus myself at the Qi Condensation 8th Layer. Killing a little girl at the Qi Condensation Seventh Layer is simply using a butcher's cleaver to slaughter a chicken."

"Keep your hands and feet clean; don't leave behind any incriminating evidence of the Xuantian Sect."

The fat deacon threw out a Storage Pouch.

"Taking people's money, we eliminate disasters for others. She won't be coming back."

The conversation ended, and the two quickly separated, disappearing into the night.

Inside the Outer Sect Herb Garden, Qi Yang slowly straightened his hunched back, a terrifying Killing Intent flashing through his turbid old eyes.

Two Qi Condensation Seventh Layer, one Qi Condensation 8th Layer!

With this kind of lineup, no matter how high Su Qinghan's talent was, once she fell into encirclement, she would definitely die with zero chance of survival!

"Should this daddy manage this nosy business, or should I not?"

Qi Yang calculated quickly in his heart.

He was a Cultivator of the survival path; what did the life or death of others have to do with him?

But Su Qinghan was different. Su Qinghan was a peace-marriage object sent by the Luoxia Sect, and the nominal "mistress" of this Special Grade Herb Garden.

If Su Qinghan died tragically outside, the Sect would inevitably reassign a new partner to him, this "widower".

By then, the protective amulet of the Special Grade Herb Garden would very likely lose its effect, and the Law Enforcement Hall might even come to thoroughly investigate him, her nominal husband!

The underground secret chamber and the garden full of top-quality Spirit Medicine that he had built with such great difficulty would all be exposed to the sunlight!

"Cutting off my tranquility and destroying my Dao foundation makes them life-and-death mortal enemies."

Qi Yang took a deep breath, his gaze turning incomparably cold and ruthless.

He was currently only at the Qi Condensation 5th Layer. Facing three assassins whose cultivation far surpassed his own, fighting them head-on wouldn't give him even a ten percent chance of winning.

The gap in Realms within the Cultivation World was like a natural chasm; even if he used his full strength, he might not be able to shatter the Spiritual Qi protective barrier of a Qi Condensation 8th Layer Cultivator.

"We cannot fight them head-on; we can only outwit them. To kill people, one doesn't necessarily have to use a sword."

Qi Yang turned around and walked into the thatched cottage, locked the door from the inside, and sneaked into the underground secret chamber.