Chapter 963: A Critical Moment

The penultimate layer contained a huge number of blood-colored beasts. All of them were Nascent Soul stage cultivators of the unorthodox path, and their number was a staggering fifty!

To defeat them, one could only spend time, killing a few, letting others escape, then returning to kill a few more, slowly grinding them down. Otherwise, a single Nascent Soul cultivator plunging in would be mobbed to death by the blood-colored beasts, becoming a ready meal.

But Jiang Fan had no time for a slow attrition. He immediately took out the Nine Phoenixes Bowing to the Dao hairpin and said, "I hope you can come through for me this time!"

Both times he had used the Nine Phoenixes Bowing to the Dao hairpin against the Sky Demon Emperor, it had failed. One time, his own soul power was insufficient, causing the phoenix bird to fail just as it was about to snatch the Sky Demon Emperor's soul. The other time, it was blocked by the illusory form of the Vajra of Mudras. If it failed again, he would simply discard this useless hairpin.

He immediately channeled all his soul power to activate the hairpin. A speck of green light appeared, rapidly growing into a phoenix tree. A phoenix bird spread its wings and flew out, easily piercing through the body of one blood-colored beast. It effortlessly snatched away its soul. Without reaching the Nascent Soul stage, the consequence of a soul leaving the body was the inability to withstand external pressure, leading to immediate dissipation.

The phoenix bird then flew towards the remaining blood-colored beasts, swiftly snatching away the souls of one gigantic beast after another. The seemingly more than fifty blood-colored beasts, all Nascent Soul stage cultivators of the unorthodox path, rapidly dwindled under the phoenix bird's swift movements. They had nowhere to escape; in mere moments, the phoenix bird caught up to them and took their souls.

Yu Peiyuan watched this scene in continuous astonishment. "What kind of magic treasure was this? It was as if it were pecking rice, taking down unorthodox Nascent Soul cultivators one bite at a time."

Just then, a sharp sword energy rapidly approached from the horizon. Jiang Fan's expression changed drastically. It was too late! He decisively took out the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain and said, "Everyone, hide behind the mountain later!"

If anything could block the sword energy, it could only be the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain's toughness, combined with the Five-Magnet Divine Light's ability to weaken sword energy. There was no other possibility. The extremely fast sword hum, piercing through eardrums, was almost upon them. Jiang Wuya had arrived!

Fortunately, the phoenix bird finally snatched the last soul and flew back, its feathers dim. The space above their heads rapidly distorted. Jiang Wuya was already close, flicking his finger, and a streak of sword light shot towards them. It was already too late to be teleported away! They would be cut into pieces mid-transport!

Jiang Fan grit his teeth and activated the Five-Magnet Divine Light. As the six-zhang divine light appeared, everyone present felt powerless. The terrifying sword light forcefully pierced through the divine light's shroud, only being weakened by twenty percent. The remaining sword light mercilessly struck the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain. *Thud! Thud!* All they heard was the grating sound of the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain being cut by the sword light.

The sword light did not penetrate the mountain, but the power it contained pushed the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain violently towards the three of them. With such force, even a single impact would shatter them into dust!

In this critical moment, Jiang Fan decisively activated the Voidflow Fire Energy, grabbing everyone and leaping into the already distorted space. They teleported out just before being crushed by the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain. Afterwards, the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain was also enveloped by spatial energy, which dissolved all the lingering power on it.

When Jiang Fan and the others appeared on the stone steps, the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain softly dropped down. Jiang Fan caught it, breaking into a cold sweat. "I was almost killed by my own magic treasure," he said. He had no time to check the Five-Magnet Primordial Mountain's condition and quickly took everyone and jumped into the space of the last step.

Jiang Wuya followed closely!

At the end of the steps, in the Azure Nether, Feng Xinie sat cross-legged on a cloud, a divine halo quietly emitting a gentle golden light behind him. Suddenly, he abruptly opened his aged eyes, a glint of sharp light flashing. He seemed to have sensed something. He took out a compass from his embrace; its needle remained still. This was the artifact used to detect Voidflow Thunder Energy.

"Did I sense incorrectly?" he mused. "Or is it another type of energy, different from Voidflow Thunder Energy?" Feng Xinie gazed at the countless steps below, his aged eyes slowly narrowing. Ten thousand steps.

When Jiang Fan saw a full hundred blood-colored beasts, all at the unorthodox Nascent Soul stage, rampaging through a city before him, he felt a deep sense of powerlessness. He could no longer activate the Nine Phoenixes Bowing to the Dao hairpin, and Jiang Wuya would not stop. A powerful streak of sword energy had already descended into this space.

However, to Jiang Fan's slight surprise, the sword energy moved away again. It seemed to be chasing something else. Yu Peiyuan exclaimed in astonishment, "I think I just saw Feng Yuanzong from the Great Yin Sect. Could it be... Jiang Wuya went after him? That guy must have brought a lot of Yin Corpses. By all appearances, he's far more evil than Junior Brother Jiang, isn't he?"

Jiang Fan let out a slight sigh of relief. "Then I'll have to trouble Senior Brother Feng a little. Let's quickly deal with these blood-colored beasts in front of us!"

Concubine Yunxia also joined in, but instead of killing, she focused solely on luring. Jiang Fan and Yu Peiyuan killed with all their might. After about the time it takes to brew a cup of tea, of the hundred-plus blood-colored beasts, only fifty or so remained. At this rate, they had a chance to successfully escape this space.

But at this very moment, a mass of dark clouds appeared on the horizon and sped towards them. From within the clouds, a Yin Corpse was occasionally thrown out, lunging backward. What met it was a streak of sword light, slicing it into perfectly neat small cubes.

Yu Peiyuan anxiously exclaimed, "Damn it, that Feng Yuanzong is luring him toward us!" From within the dark clouds, Feng Yuanzong roared repeatedly, "You're the ones who lured Jiang Wuya here! Now I'm giving him back to you!"

It was no wonder he was furious. He had been systematically killing the blood-colored beasts, confident of securing first place. Who knew that Jiang Wuya would burst in and head straight for him? Left with no choice, he released Yin Corpses one by one to divert Jiang Wuya's attention, barely managing to survive until now. However, most of his Yin Corpses had been annihilated by Jiang Wuya. In particular, three precious Nascent Soul stage Yin Corpses had also been cleaved apart by Jiang Wuya. These were treasures of the Great Yin Sect, secretly given to him by the sect master just before ascending the Ancient Path to Heaven. His ability to pull ahead of everyone else was crucially dependent on those three Nascent Soul Yin Corpses.

But who could have known that Jiang Wuya would appear halfway through! Not only were his Yin Corpses destroyed, but if he couldn't finish off the blood-colored beasts, it wouldn't count as successfully climbing the steps. Therefore, he couldn't allow Jiang Fan and his group to successfully kill the blood-colored beasts either. He desperately lured Jiang Wuya towards them.

A terrifying residual sword light suddenly sliced through the dark clouds. In terror, Feng Yuanzong threw out several Yin Corpses at the late Core Formation stage, which offset most of the sword energy. At the same time, a skeleton formed from condensed Yin energy appeared on his body, blocking another sword strike for him. Even so, he lost most of his life, plummeting from the sky to the ground. And that was just the residual power of the sword light! Who could withstand a full sword strike?

What made their hearts pound even more was that Jiang Wuya was in pursuit! A figure in moon-white robes, carrying a sword sheath on his back, approached with the speed of lightning. One moment he was on the horizon; the next, he was just a few miles away!

A strong sense of alarm rose in Jiang Fan's heart! Looking at the fifty remaining blood-colored beasts before him, he gritted his teeth and said, "Remember to support me." He took out the Hook Judgment Pen. A hint of fear appeared on his face. He was still terrified of the consequences of using this pen, but he couldn't worry about that now. He immediately picked up the pen and began to move.