Chapter 3791: Haoyang City

Beside each teleportation array stood a silver stone tablet over two feet tall, inscribed with text.

Sun Yu stepped onto a teleportation array. The silver stone tablet beside it bore the two large golden characters "Haoyang". Wang Qingshan and the others followed suit, stepping onto the array.

Sun Yu activated a spell. The teleportation array vibrated slightly, and a dazzling spiritual light shot up into the sky, engulfing their figures.

Not long after, the spiritual light dissipated, and Wang Qingshan found themselves in a spacious and brightly lit hall containing five teleportation arrays.

A refined-looking scholar in a white robe and a beautiful girl in a pink skirt stood to the side. The white-robed scholar was a Mid-Stage True Immortal, and the pink-skirted girl was an Early-Stage True Immortal.

"Senior Sister Sun," the white-robed scholar said with a frown, "are all these fellow cultivators newly assigned? Why are there so many Early-Stage True Immortals?"

Among Wang Qingshan and the more than twenty others, Early-Stage True Immortals accounted for the majority.

"There's no choice," Sun Yu explained. "We've encountered several setbacks within the last fifty thousand years, but there are still some powerful cultivators around. You just need to defend Haoyang. Fellow Daoist Wang, Fellow Daoist Meng, these are Junior Brother Gao and Junior Sister Sun. Junior Brother Gao is in charge of Haoyang City; you just need to follow his orders. I have other matters to attend to, so I'll be leaving first."

Sun Yu said, gesturing to the white-robed scholar. She then walked onto a teleportation array, activated a spell, and a dazzling spiritual light shot up into the sky, engulfing her figure.

"My name is Gao Bin," the white-robed scholar introduced himself. "Fellow Daoists, please follow me! I'll first introduce you to the situation in Haoyang City."

"My name is Sun Ya," the pink-skirted girl said with a smile. "Senior Brother Gao's words just now were not malicious. Fellow Daoists, please don't overthink it. You'll understand once you learn about Haoyang City's situation."

Wang Qingshan and the others followed Gao Bin out of the hall. They found that the hall was built on the summit of a high peak. Standing on the peak, they could see a massive city.

The city wall to the southeast had a large breach. A team of cultivators was repairing the city wall. The wall was constructed from massive black bricks, and formation masters were inscribing array patterns on it, setting up formations.

There were many buildings inside the city; many had collapsed and were being rebuilt.

"Fellow Daoist Gao," Meng Yilong asked with a frown, "was this caused by Chaos Beasts?"

"Not long ago," Gao Bin said with a sigh, his face filled with regret, "a horde of Chaos Beasts attacked Haoyang City. The formations were breached, and many fellow cultivators perished, including a Late-Stage True Immortal."

Without formation protection, True Immortal cultivators were no match for the Chaos Beast horde and suffered heavy casualties.

"How many times has Haoyang City been breached by Chaos Beasts?" Chen Yueying asked.

"Counting from when I was assigned to Haoyang City," Gao Bin replied truthfully, "this is the second time."

"Do Chaos Beast hordes frequently attack Haoyang City?" Ni Tianlong asked. "How many True Immortal cultivators are in the city? Can even immortal formations not withstand them? Why are there no Immortal Extermination Cannons?"

"Chaos Beast hordes don't frequently attack Haoyang City," Gao Bin slowly explained. "It's not fixed. If we're lucky, there won't be any attacks for tens of thousands of years. If we're unlucky, we'll encounter a Chaos Beast tide every few hundred years. There are three True Immortal cultivators in the city, and with you all, there are over thirty. Chaos Beasts possess immense power. A First-Grade immortal formation can't withstand too many Chaos Beasts. The Immortal Extermination Cannons were destroyed during the previous two breaches. To kill an Early-Stage True Immortal Chaos Beast often requires four or five True Immortal cultivators to work together, and there can still be casualties."

"Even ordinary low-grade immortal artifacts find it difficult to harm True Immortal-level Chaos Beasts," Sun Ya added. "Immortal Extermination Cannons are among the few things that can wound a Chaos Beast with a single strike. If we had multiple low-grade Immortal Extermination Cannons, there would be a chance to kill a True Immortal-level Chaos Beast."

Wang Qingshan and the others had already reviewed the Ye family True Immortals' insights on killing Chaos Beasts. What Sun Ya said was similar: it was extremely difficult to kill a Chaos Beast in a one-on-one fight. Otherwise, the Nine Immortals Sect wouldn't have suffered such heavy losses.

"Haoyang City has a First-Grade immortal mine, a Profound Water Jade Crystal ore vein, which can be mined for millions of years," Gao Bin explained. "True Immortal cultivators guarding Haoyang City can obtain some Profound Water Jade Crystals annually, provided Haoyang City is not breached by Chaos Beasts. In the eyes of Chaos Beasts, we are all highly nourishing supplements."

Cities on the Chaos Continent are divided into five grades: Immortal, Heaven, Earth, Profound, and Yellow. Nine Immortals City is a "Profound" grade city. There are over ten "Yellow" grade cities in its periphery. Each city possesses cultivation resources such as spiritual water, mineral veins, spiritual wood, spiritual herbs, and so on. Otherwise, the Nine Immortals Sect would not have dispatched heavy troops to guard them.

They arrived at a sprawling manor, featuring pavilions, towers, winding vines, and green bamboo.

They sat down in a blue stone pavilion. Sun Ya explained in detail the situation of the Chaos Beast tides and their assigned tasks.

The timing of Chaos Beast tides is not fixed. Generally, they would cultivate within the city, ensuring that cultivators could smoothly mine Profound Water Jade Crystals.

The number of True Immortal cultivators stationed in each "Yellow" grade city is not fixed. Generally, cities with more cultivation resources have more True Immortal cultivators stationed there.

Nine Immortals City is a "Profound" grade city. It has a Second-Grade immortal mine and is garrisoned by several Golden Immortal cultivators. Furthermore, the Nine Immortals Sect also controls another "Profound" grade city—Jiuyang City—which contains a Second-Grade immortal mine, the Jiuyang Flaming Jade. These two Second-Grade immortal mines are important sources of income for the Nine Immortals Sect.

Haoyang City has shops and is rich in cultivation resources, mostly providing for cultivators below the True Immortal stage. True Immortal cultivators can go to Nine Immortals City to purchase cultivation resources, but they must apply to Gao Bin and can only go in batches.

The Nine Immortals Sect controls over twenty cities in total: two "Profound" grade cities and twenty-three "Yellow" grade cities. Most "Yellow" grade cities are located in remote areas and have not been attacked by Chaos Beast hordes for many years, requiring only a few True Immortal cultivators to be stationed there.

After hearing Gao Bin's introduction, Wang Qingshan was secretly astonished. The number of Immortals across the twenty-three cities amounted to at least two hundred, and that was an underestimation.

"Fellow Daoist Gao, Immortal Sun," Lan Fkong asked, "I've heard that Immortals are not allowed to fight to the death on the Chaos Continent?"

"The explicit rule states that it is forbidden," Sun Ya explained. "However, during expansion and territory development, cultivators might still clash fiercely over important cultivation resources, but these conflicts are restricted to certain areas. Golden Immortal cultivators generally do not engage in life-or-death battles. True Immortal cultivators occasionally do, but it's rare. Immortals rarely leave the cities alone; most travel between cities via teleportation. Fighting to the death is prohibited within cities, which all have training grounds for cultivators to spar and compete."

"Can Chaos Beasts not be subdued?" Ci Lei asked curiously. "Can the methods used to deal with demonic beasts be applied to Chaos Beasts?"

"To my knowledge, few Immortals can subdue Chaos Beasts," Sun Ya replied. "Even if they do, the numbers are not significant. Chaos Beasts are very different from demonic beasts. Ordinary attacks find it difficult to kill them. However, laws such as the Law of Time, Law of Space, Law of Soul, Law of Dreams, and Law of Curses can easily kill Chaos Beasts. But most Immortals master the Five Element Laws, making it very difficult to kill a Chaos Beast in a one-on-one fight."