20: Chapter 20 Black Wind

Qingyun Market, West Gate.

The gray sky hung very low, as if it might collapse at any moment. More than fifty apprentices and low-level Loose Cultivators, who had been forcibly conscripted, huddled together shivering, like a group of pigs and sheep waiting to be slaughtered.

Four Blood-Clad Guards draped in blood-colored cloaks stood like gods of death, positioned at the four corners.

"The time has come, open the Formation!" the leader commanded coldly.

Accompanied by a low rumble, the pale golden light curtain of the Formation that had protected the market for over a hundred years slowly cracked open, revealing an aperture only wide enough for two people to pass through side-by-side.

A cold wind carrying the stench of rotting leaves and decay instantly poured in from outside the Formation.

"Out of the Formation! Move faster!" The Blood-Clad Guards brandished the barbed Magical Artifact whips in their hands, driving the group of low-level Cultivators—most of whom were only at Qi Refining Stage 1 or 2—out of the light curtain like livestock.

Gu Shen, carrying a basket for gathering plants, blended into the middle of the crowd.

As soon as he stepped out of the Formation, the Spiritual Qi in the world suddenly became violent and chaotic. The view in the distance was blocked by a dim, dense primeval forest, with faint black miasma permeating the trees.

Black Wind Forest, thirty miles away.

"Everyone take one Miasma-Clearing Pill." The leader tossed out a cloth bag. The mouth of the bag opened, spilling gray Medicinal Pills all over the ground. "The medicinal effect only lasts for four hours. Within these four hours, everyone must collect ten red blood vines or Qi Gathering herbs. Those who don't meet the quota don't need to return!"

The crowd dared not resist and hurriedly picked up the Medicinal Pills from the ground and swallowed them.

Gu Shen also picked one up. The Medicinal Pill felt coarse to the touch, clearly the lowest quality of defective goods. He swallowed it without hesitation, but the moment the pill entered his abdomen, he used the exceptionally pure spiritual power in his Dantian to tightly wrap around it, allowing only the medicinal efficacy to disperse, ensuring not a trace of pill poison invaded his Meridians.

"Spread out, keep moving forward!"

The four Blood-Clad Guards formed a semi-encirclement, following thirty yards behind the crowd, their Divine Sense intertwined to seal off any path of retreat.

Entering the forest.

The light instantly dimmed. All around were towering ancient trees, and the fallen leaves underfoot had accumulated for who knows how many years; one step down, and the foul-smelling sludge sank right up to the ankles.

Gu Shen stepped lightly in his shadow shoes.

He hunched his body slightly, holding a dead tree branch he had picked up from the ground, poking through the grass as if earnestly looking for Spiritual Plants, while in reality, his Divine Sense had already silently spread out.

Fifteen yards.

Within this range, no movement could escape his perception.

He began to intentionally or unintentionally deviate from the center of the main group, moving bit by bit toward the leftmost edge of the Formation. The terrain there was rugged, with dense shrubs.

To escape, he had to first break free from the Divine Sense lock of the Blood-Clad Guards.

One hour later.

The group had penetrated five miles into the Black Wind Forest. During this time, they encountered a few Tier 1 Yao Beasts, all of which were dealt with by the Loose Cultivators on the perimeter fighting for their lives. Two people died, and the Blood-Clad Guards didn't even glance at them.

"It's too quiet."

Gu Shen stopped, his brow slightly furrowed.

According to the records in the "Geography of Mountains and Rivers," while the periphery of the Black Wind Forest was dangerous, it shouldn't be so devoid of life that there wasn't even a bird chirping, apart from a few low-level Yao Beasts.

The feeling was as if the living creatures in this area had been cleared out or frightened away by some more terrifying existence in advance.

Just as Gu Shen noticed something was wrong.

A sudden change occurred!

Whoosh—!

An extremely sharp whistling sound exploded from the depths of the dense forest.

Immediately after, a dazzling blood-colored blade light, like a waning moon, tore through the layers of miasma and, with lightning speed, slashed directly at a Blood-Clad Guard at the back of the group!

"Enemy attack!"

The Blood-Clad Guard leader roared, but it was too late.

The targeted Blood-Clad Guard didn't even have time to fully activate his protective spiritual light before he was cleaved in two, along with his Magical Artifact, by the blood-colored blade light! A rain of blood poured down from the sky.

"Hehehe... little dogs of the Danding Sect, Grandpa has been waiting here for a long time!"

From the treetops in all directions, more than a dozen Cultivators wearing black robes and Asura masks suddenly leaped out. The aura on them was cold and tyrannical; they were clearly all Demonic Cultivators of the Late Stage of Qi Refining!

Blood Fiend Sect!

"Kill! Leave none alive, extract their souls and refine their blood!"

The Demonic Cultivators laughed wildly as they pounced into the crowd.

"Form up! Meet the enemy!" The Blood-Clad Guard leader's eyes were splitting with rage as he drew his long saber to meet them.

In an instant, spiritual light exploded, the roar of colliding Magical Artifacts, screams, and the sound of flesh being torn intertwined, and the entire periphery of the Black Wind Forest instantly turned into a slaughterhouse.

Those apprentices and Loose Cultivators gathering plants had no power to resist at all, falling like wheat being harvested.

It was chaos.

Utter chaos.

And at the first flash of the blade light.

Gu Shen didn't even look back to see who was fighting whom; his legs went limp, and his entire body collapsed into the waist-deep humus and fallen leaves as if he were a lifeless corpse.

"Now is the time."

There was not a ripple of emotion in Gu Shen's eyes.

Using all four limbs, he utilized the stealth properties of his shadow shoes, moving like a gecko sliding along the ground, crawling wildly away from the battlefield along the thick tree roots.

No drawing his blade, no using Spells, not leaking a single shred of spiritual power.

In the aftermath of a melee between Late-Stage Qi Refining Cultivators, any excess spiritual power fluctuation would become a torch in the night.

Ten yards, twenty yards, fifty yards.

Gu Shen's movements were extremely fast; in the blink of an eye, he had crawled out of the central area of the melee.

As long as he climbed over the slope covered in poisonous thorns ahead, he could disappear completely into the deep forest.

Swish!

Just then, a black shadow suddenly dropped from the tree trunk above, blocking Gu Shen's path.

It was a gaunt-looking Demonic Cultivator, with Qi Refining Stage 4 cultivation, holding a dripping white-bone soul-summoning banner. He had originally been responsible for clearing out any survivors on the periphery, and now he had just happened to run into Gu Shen, who was "crawling" along.

"Oh?"

The Demonic Cultivator licked his lips, a hint of mockery in his eyes, "There's still a rat that knows how to hide like a loach. Your concealment of cultivation is not bad; you almost fooled me."

Gu Shen lay in the mud, stopped moving, and raised his head, his face covered in black mud, looking terrified.

"Don't kill me... I'll give you all my Spirit Stones..."

He trembled as he reached for the Storage Pouch at his waist.

"Hehehe, if I kill you, the Spirit Stones will be mine anyway, and your Divine Soul can be used to feed my blood banner!"

The Demonic Cultivator had no intention of wasting words; he shook the white-bone banner in his hand, and a cold black Qi transformed into a large skeletal mouth, biting fiercely at Gu Shen's face.

Five steps away, there was no avoiding it.

But Gu Shen had never intended to avoid it.

The moment the skeletal mouth was about to bite down, his originally terrified eyes suddenly turned into a frozen, deadly silence.

Inside his Sea of Consciousness, the Great Furnace trembled.

That transparent spike, which had been repeatedly hammered and condensed to the extreme, shot out instantly, following Gu Shen's gaze!

Soul-Shocking Spike!

Silent and soundless, shadowless and formless.

The sinister grin on the Demonic Cultivator's face hadn't even fully formed before he felt as if a red-hot steel needle had been violently thrust into the center of his brow, twisting fiercely inside his brain.

"Ah—!"

The Demonic Cultivator let out an extremely shrill scream, and the light on the white-bone banner in his hand instantly dimmed. He clutched his head tightly with both hands, black blood flowing from his seven orifices, and he fell straight backward.

Divine Sense damaged, backlash of magical power!

This was the terror of Divine Sense attacks; once successful, it was a one-sided slaughter.

Gu Shen did not hesitate at all.

As the Demonic Cultivator fell, he exerted force with his legs, and his whole body lunged out like a leopard.

The spiritual power he had suppressed in his body for so long erupted instantly, and golden light flickered on his right index finger.

Chii!

He pointed a finger.

The Geng Metal Qi of the Golden Light Finger, condensed like a needle, easily pierced the Demonic Cultivator's unguarded throat.

Life extinguished.

The entire exchange took less than two breaths!

Gu Shen landed and took a deep breath. Using the Soul-Shocking Spike in actual combat for the first time had consumed nearly twenty percent of his Divine Sense power, and a slight sense of dizziness washed over his head.

But he had no time to rest.

The roaring from afar continued, and other Demonic Cultivators could arrive at any moment.

He walked quickly to the Demonic Cultivator's corpse.

He snatched the Storage Pouch from the other party's waist, then placed one hand on the warm corpse of the Demonic Cultivator.

"Collect."

A gray light flashed.

The corpse of a Qi Refining Stage 4 Demonic Cultivator, along with the dropped white-bone banner, was instantly sucked into the [Heaven and Earth Furnace] in his Sea of Consciousness.

On the ground, apart from a few drops of black blood mixed in the mud, nothing remained.

Destroying the corpse and erasing the traces, clean and efficient.

After doing all this, Gu Shen did not look back. He mobilized his spiritual power, performed the most basic Lightness Spell, and like a black ghost, plunged into the thick, impenetrable miasma deep in the Black Wind Forest.

Behind him, the towering Formation light curtain of Qingyun Market grew smaller and smaller in his eyes.

The cage was broken.

The sea is wide enough for fish to leap, and the sky is high enough for birds to fly.