99: Snake spirit, you were deliberately lured here.

The next day, as dawn broke.

Ye Feiyan carried the ant-like head and headed straight for the building in the center of Fallen Immortal City... the Wartime Merit Hall!

Inside the Merit Hall, people were coming and going.

The Elder responsible for exchanging contribution value was an Inner Sect Elder with white hair, a youthful face, and a cultivation at the Late Golden Core Stage.

When Ye Feiyan placed the Beast Spirit head, which still retained a trace of eerie aura, onto the counter.

The Elder, who had been bored, just glanced at it casually.

However!

That one glance!

His half-closed old eyes suddenly widened to the size of saucers!

"This... this is... 'Spirit Ant'?!"

He gasped, his face filled with incomparable astonishment!

How could he not recognize this fellow?!

Just half a month ago, within the Sect, a gifted Personal Disciple, in whom a certain Peak Master had placed high hopes, had died silently under an assassination by this very creature!

Furthermore!

Even the Deacon Elder responsible for protection had failed to take its life!

It had escaped calmly right under the nose of a Cultivator at the Golden Core Realm!

But now...

This top-tier assassin, who had given the entire upper echelon of the Beast Taming Sect such a headache, had actually...

Had actually been slaughtered just like that?!

He raised his head, his gaze filled with endless shock, and landed on Ye Feiyan's cold and stunningly beautiful face.

"Little... little friend..."

"Did you kill this person?"

"Yes."

Ye Feiyan nodded indifferently.

Hiss—!

Upon receiving this affirmative reply, the Elder gasped again!

He looked at Ye Feiyan as if he were looking at a monster!

"Good! Good indeed!"

A moment later, he stroked his beard and laughed, his face full of undisguised admiration!

"Truly, a hero is born in youth! A hero is born in youth!"

After the praise, he did not hesitate any longer and immediately exchanged the corresponding contribution value for Ye Feiyan.

"According to Sect regulations, killing a 'Spirit Ant' earns three hundred contribution value!"

...

Leaving the Merit Hall.

When Ye Feiyan returned to that quiet courtyard.

She saw Senior Sister Bai Yunxi, Third Senior Sister Qin Xiaohui, Second Senior Brother Lin Yao, and Mysterious Ink, who was lazing around on the stone table, gathered in the courtyard.

"Junior Sister, come quickly!"

Seeing her return, the three of them quickly greeted her to sit down.

"Junior Sister," Senior Sister Bai Yunxi spoke first, her cold, pretty face filled with gravity, "The Sect has just issued a mandatory... assassination mission to our Fourth Squad!"

Ye Feiyan looked at her, puzzled, waiting for the rest.

After a pause, Bai Yunxi said, word by word.

"The target is 'Spirit Snake'!"

"According to intelligence that the Sect had great difficulty obtaining, this person is an extremely important Hidden Agent planted by the Myriad Spirits Sect in our Fallen Immortal City!"

"His cultivation is at least at... the Early Stage of the Golden Core Realm!"

"As for anything else, we know nothing."

"If we can complete this mission, each of the four of us in the squad can receive two hundred contribution value!"

Two hundred contribution value?

Ye Feiyan pondered slightly; two hundred contribution value was acceptable.

"Yes, Junior Sister, there is more."

Qin Xiaohui spoke up, adding: "According to reports, this person usually disguises himself as a lonely old woman running a tea stall in the west of the city."

"He lurks in Fallen Immortal City under this identity, waiting for opportunities to assassinate our Sect's Geniuses or important figures!"

"There are still many such Hidden Agents in our Fallen Immortal City!"

"That is why the Sect decided to let us eliminate him quietly through assassination!"

"The goal is to avoid alerting the enemy and causing those Hidden Agents who have not yet been exposed to flee in fear!"

"Fine."

Upon hearing this, Ye Feiyan agreed without hesitation!

Two hundred contribution value!

Added to what she obtained from killing the Spirit Ant, it would be just enough to exchange for one of the main medicinal ingredients needed to refine the "infant transformation pill"!

...

Night fell once again.

Four figures, like ghosts, merged silently into the endless night.

It was Ye Feiyan and the others.

Soon, they arrived in front of that unremarkable... tea stall in the west of the city.

The tea stall was very simple.

There were only two or three dilapidated tables and chairs.

An old woman who looked to be about seventy or eighty years old, with a face full of wrinkles and a hunched figure, was carrying a pot of hot tea, serving the only two or three guests with some difficulty.

However, the moment she saw this old woman, Ye Feiyan's cold phoenix eyes narrowed slightly!

She saw through the old woman's situation at a glance.

Like that "Spirit Ant", this fellow was also a "Beast Spirit"!

It was just that its true form should have devoured a large number of... snake-race Divine Souls!

The four of them walked up calmly and found the most remote table to sit down at.

"Dear guests, what would you like to drink?"

The old woman walked over, leaning on a cane, trembling, with a kind and simple smile on her face.

"Granny, bring us a pot of hot tea to warm ourselves up."

Bai Yunxi smiled gently and said.

"Alright, please wait a moment."

The old woman nodded with a loving expression; one could not tell at all that she was a practitioner.

Soon, the tea was served.

"Granny, are you the only one here?"

Bai Yunxi asked while drinking.

The other three did not speak, because they were waiting for the best time to act.

"Yes, it's just me, an old woman."

Spirit Snake replied with a chuckle.

"Granny, do you have no other relatives?"

"No, they..."

Just as Bai Yunxi was chatting idly with the old woman.

Mysterious Ink, which had been coiled on Ye Feiyan's shoulder, slid down silently.

Its shrunken body, under the cover of the night, slipped away like ink melting into water, quietly slinking to the dark corner behind the tea stall, where it coiled and lay in wait.

The time it takes to drink a cup of tea passed quickly.

"Hehe..."

At this moment!

The old woman suddenly let out a... strange laugh that was completely inconsistent with her appearance!

Her old face, which had been full of kindness and simplicity, twisted completely at this moment!

Replacing it was a sneer, full of endless coldness and cruelty!

"Alright, little girl, no need to ask so much; I am the person you are looking for."

He spoke, sweeping his gaze over the four of Ye Feiyan, a look of satisfaction appearing on his face: "The four Personal Disciples of Immortal Master Jinyun have all arrived."

"This old woman—no, I—am truly flattered."

Boom!!!

As soon as these words were spoken, the expressions of Bai Yunxi, Qin Xiaohui, and Lin Yao changed drastically!

As for Ye Feiyan, she was still drinking tea calmly, as if she were an outsider.

"You... you knew it all along?!"

Bai Yunxi said in shock.

"Correct."

Spirit Snake sneered and admitted.

"I deliberately exposed my location!"

"It was just to wait for you self-righteous juniors to come and die!"

"After finishing this job, I can fly away far and wide!"

"And the heads of you four..."

He stretched out his withered, chicken-claw-like hand, pointed at the four of them, his turbid old eyes filled with endless greed!

"They will be just enough to exchange for a quite decent... 'Soul' for me!"

As the voice fell!

He moved!

The cane in his hand, which looked ordinary, slammed into the ground!

"Hum—!"

"The Human Race's 'Spirit-Sealing Formation' is indeed very useful!"

Spirit-Sealing Formation?!

Hearing these three words, the faces of Bai Yunxi, Qin Xiaohui, and Lin Yao changed wildly again!

In their hearts, huge waves were stirred up!

This was an extremely vicious sealing Formation!

Once activated, it could greatly suppress the circulation of magic power of all Cultivators within the Formation!

It made Cultivators have profound cultivation but be unable to display it!

The higher the Rank of the Formation, the more terrifying the suppression effect!

"Hehe..."

Spirit Snake laughed strangely, his gaze like he was looking at four lambs about to be slaughtered.

"Wait for death!"

"Juniors!"

However...

One second passed.

Two seconds passed.

A full three seconds passed...

The terrifying Formation that was supposed to completely imprison them all showed no movement at all!

"???"

The old face of Spirit Snake, which had been full of sneers, froze instantly!

He was stunned!

What happened?!

The Formation...

Why was there no reaction?!