Aspiring to the Immortal Path
chapter-481

This was a bleak wasteland engulfed in pitch blackness, with nothing to be seen.

Suddenly, a wind howled.

A fissure appeared above the wasteland, like a ghost had swiped its claws across space.

Three people tumbled out of the fissure: Tang Jie, Yiyi, and Xu Hanling.

The fissure lasted only for the blink of an eye, even for the three of them. When they closed their eyes, they were still on Rally Peak, in the Hall of Mystery, but when they opened their eyes, they found themselves in another land.

Tang Jie jumped to his feet and looked around in confusion.

He then looked at Xu Hanling, who was also shocked.

He was the one who had activated the Space Crystal, so it was impossible for him to not know where they were being teleported. But it was clear that this was not the place Xu Hanling had wanted to go. Tang Jie needed to think for only a moment to understand why.

It was because Tang Jie and Yiyi had hitched a ride.

When it came to extremely long-distance teleportation, a centimeter's miscalculation could lead to one missing the target by hundreds of kilometers. The addition of the two of them had put the teleportation off course so much that even Xu Hanling hadn't been able to reach where he wanted to go.

Even so, after looking around at the unfamiliar terrain, Tang Jie could guess that they probably weren't in Sageheart and were probably very close to Xu Hanling's target destination.

If he was right, they were probably in the territory of the Beast Refining Gate or Godhead Palace.

"Where were you teleporting to?" he asked.

"Junior!" Xu Hanling glared at Tang Jie. If this guy hadn't meddled, he would have already completed his mission.

"It seems like you don't plan to reply," Tang Jie sighed. "You're wearing Godhead Armor, so you should have some connection to Godhead Palace. Could this place be in Nadir Hill? It seems like Godhead Palace and the Beast Refining Gate don't get along as well as they outwardly appear to. Ah, I suppose that's to be expected. After all, the Thousand Passions Sect put a spy in my Basking Moon Sect."

"You're seeking death!" Xu Hanling roared, thrusting a finger at Tang Jie.

Tang Jie used the Chaoswind Step and then threw out the Mountain River State Diagram.

The moment the Mountain River State Diagram appeared, the cliff and waterfall of the Great Broken Stream appeared in the wasteland.

The Great Broken Stream contained the Eternal Universe Formation, and countless creatures could be glimpsed roaming about that world.

And under that waterfall stood a person.

When the Mountain River State Diagram was rolled up, he was just a person in the painting, fishing in the waterfall.

But when the Mountain River State Diagram was unrolled, he raised his head, two green flames burning in his eye sockets.

The ghost guard!

The Eternal Universe Formation within the Mountain River State Diagram allowed creatures to be placed inside it, and these creatures were the foundation that sustained the teleportation formation. Thus, the Mountain River State Diagram was a good place to store things that couldn't be exposed to the public eye.

For this reason, once Tang Jie got the ghost guard, the Mountain River State Diagram gained a new painted person.

He was the strongest ally that could be summoned outside of the original body, and a hidden card that Tang Jie was reluctant to use.

But since he was in a desolate land, there was nothing to fear now.

As he threw out the Mountain River State Diagram, Tang Jie said, "Kill him."

That dark figure lunged at Xu Hanling.

A battle between a dragon and a tiger ensued, but Tang Jie didn't even give it a glance.

He took a few steps forward, and looked around. Despite the indifferent look on his face, his eyes were brimming with wariness.

He grabbed some soil from the ground and sniffed it.

He released his grip, allowing the soil to fall through his fingers.

As the soil drifted in the wind, Tang Jie's eyes turned grave.

He suddenly scratched at the earth, turning his hands into hoes, and he soon dug out a long trench. His dirt-covered hand picked out a little black stone from the bottom of the trench.

He brought the stone up to his eyes, his expression turning even graver.

"This is trouble!" Tang Jie muttered.

"Aaah!" Xu Hanling bitterly screamed as the combined attack of the ghost guard and Yiyi sent him flying.

He flew in Tang Jie's direction. Xu Hanling saw that Tang Jie had his back to him and rejoiced. He felt like this was a chance and chopped a palm at him, but then Tang Jie turned around and thrust out a finger.

The finger pierced through the Godhead Armor like it was made of tofu, stabbing into Xu Hanling's body.

Xu Hanling's body froze as he looked in disbelief at his chest. "Jade… Shattering… Finger!"

The finger erupted with light. It was only a small ball of light at first, but then it became like a rising sun, and Xu Hanling's chest began to melt away.

He obstinately grabbed at Tang Jie. "No… I'm a True Person…"

"I know," Tang Jie coldly said.

Xu Hanling saw Tang Jie's callous expression and seemed to realize something. He suddenly roared, "I won't die at your hands!"

His body erupted with power as he chopped a palm at Tang Jie's forehead.

But he had barely moved when two streaks of blood shot out, and Xu Hanling found his arm was disobediently flying off into the air.

He howled and turned to see the ghost guard slowly drawing his hands back from the stump of his arm. Xu Hanling trembled, but all he could do was weakly yell.

His body erupted with light.

Celestial Heart detonation!

But a moment later, the sun on Tang Jie's finger completely devoured him.

Without even having the chance to self-detonate, he dissolved into spiritual energy and dispersed into the air.

Drawing back his finger, Tang Jie didn't even glance at Xu Hanling's Mustard Seed Bag. He was focused solely on the little black stone, as if it was the most important thing in the world.

Yiyi ran over and asked, "Big Brother, do you know where we are?"

"Mm." Tang Jie raised the black stone. "This is Resentment Rock, said to be created when a living creature dies. This substance is extremely corrosive to life, and it's ideal for use in slow-acting poisons. It can also serve as a formation material or for refining ghosts. The ghost guard was made from this kind of material."

"And…?"

"Because of its ability to corrode life force, places where Resentment Rocks can be found are bound to be wastelands, with nothing but weeds growing there. In the Rosecloud Domain, the place with the greatest concentration of Resentment Rocks is the Plain of Departed Souls."

"'The Plain of Departed Souls'?" The little girl paled.

The numerous departed souls here had created large amounts of Resentment Rock, which made the wasteland's Yin energy extremely strong. A normal person would die in a few days here, and even a cultivator would be affected if they stayed too long, the Resentment Rocks eating away at their life force.

But this wasn't the crux of the matter. Most importantly… this place was very close to Godhead Palace.

Although the Space Crystal hadn't been able to deliver them to Godhead Palace, it had at least taken them to the Plain of Departed Souls, only one step away from Godhead Palace.

"Use the Space Crystal!" The little girl was sharp, saying, "The Space Crystal could bring us here, so it can take us back. Big Brother, with the White Tiger essence blood Bao'er gave you, you must be able to control the Space Crystal."

She grabbed the Space Crystal from Xu Hanling's remains.

The crystal was now lusterless, no longer its dazzling self.

Tang Jie took it and looked it over before shaking his head. "It's out of energy, so we can't use it for now."

"Huh? How?" Yiyi's eyes flew open.

Tang Jie lightly raised the Space Crystal. "While the two crystals are divine items, they need energy to power them. The Space Crystal is naturally capable of teleporting someone around a domain, but the problem is that it's missing a corner, which is essentially a hole, like with the Cosmic Breeze Pearl. This hole isn't at the bottom, but around the center, so some energy can still accumulate beneath the hole. But once the energy starts to surmount the hole, it will start to slowly leak out. Moreover, this person used the White Tiger's blood to forcibly activate the crystal. As he did not have the bloodline and did not understand the Dao of Space, he had to expend ten times the usual energy, and then we joined in, so it naturally used up all the energy it had. It's actually fortunate that it didn't have enough energy, or we would already be in Godhead Palace."

"Then what do we do?" Yiyi asked.

Tang Jie put away the Space Crystal and said, "Our first priority is to get out of here. Once we leave Nadir Hill, we're safe."

As he finished speaking, he suddenly sensed something and looked at Xu Hanling's corpse.

Once a cultivator attained a spiritual body, when they died, most of their flesh and blood would dissolve into spiritual energy, with the rest turning into dust. Rarely was something left behind. If there was, it meant that this person hadn't cultivated properly. For this reason, "Returned Remnants" was usually only used to refer to the remains of people who had gotten past the Three Witherings. While one's spiritual energy would return to the earth if one died before this, it wouldn't cause much of a stir, so one wouldn't have the right to enter a paradise to Return one's Remnants.

This Xu Hanling had been a True Person, and while his strength was average, he had still achieved a spiritual body. His body had now dissolved into spiritual light, and while he hadn't created spirit rain like Xu Muyang or Luo Hanzhen, he had still created a rainbow cloud of spirit light.

Now, as Tang Jie looked at the site of Xu Hanling's remains, he saw several rock-like objects.

These objects were actually the remains left by people who didn't cultivate properly. In the cultivation world, they were called Rotten Bones, mortal substances left behind when someone hadn't shed enough of their mortality. They were impurities, and they were called Rotten Bones in reference to the saying "One cannot carve rotten wood."

Tang Jie looked at Xu Hanling's Rotten Bones and then suddenly squatted down, picking something out from them.

This substance seemed to be a Rotten Bone, but it was actually different. Rotten Bones had a gray-white color, but this substance was white mixed with yellow, something between metal and wood.

Tang Jie raised it up to more closely inspect it. Suddenly, there was a flash of spiritual light, and a scene flitted past his eyes.

Stunned, Tang Jie threw out the object and shouted, "Shit! This is a Secret Bone!"

A Secret Bone was a special magic tool implanted in the body, allowing oneself to be tracked from a vast distance. Once implanted, it could not be removed. This item was very difficult to detect, such that even Violet Palace Titans couldn't sense it. Of course, they had the corresponding price, so they were normally used only for high-level scouts.

It wasn't strange for a True Person spy like Xu Hanling to have one implanted in him.

The problem was that this meant that Tang Jie's position was exposed.

Tang Jie grabbed the Secret Bone and cast a spell, creating a little eagle. He threw the Secret Bone into the eagle's mouth, and the eagle flew off.

But using the eagle to move the Secret Bone was only a temporary countermeasure. Once Godhead Palace found it, they would definitely be able to conclude that Xu Hanling was dead and someone else had taken the Space Crystal. They would then lock down the area, and Tang Jie would find it very hard to escape Nadir Hill.

No matter what, he had to escape before Godhead Palace found out. Grabbing Yiyi, he shouted, "We're going!" and he flew into the air.

Nadir Hill was in the west and Sageheart was in the east. No matter where he was in Nadir Hill, there was nothing wrong with flying eastward.

As he flew along, after around an hour, Tang Jie suddenly spotted a hazy cloud rising from the distance.

This cloud flew up to a high altitude and then stopped, transforming into several hundred streaks of light that instantly covered all of Nadir Hill.

When Tang Jie saw this, he knew that he was done for. Godhead Palace had found the Secret Bone and thus determined that Xu Hanling was dead and the Space Crystal was with someone else.

The cloud was an alarm that told the entire sect to be on alert. It wasn't just Godhead Palace, but all of the minor sects under it that had received this report and been notified to stop all suspicious people.

The only upside was that the Basking Moon Sect was too far away for Godhead Palace to have received word of what had happened there. Thus, Godhead Palace probably didn't know who had come with Xu Hanling and stolen the Space Crystal.

But Tang Jie trusted that it would take a day at most for Godhead Palace to find out.

Once they knew that it was Tang Jie, given their relationship, Godhead Palace would go to any length to find him, scouring the heavens and digging out the earth if they had to.

Thus, in this one day, he had to escape from Nadir Hill.

At his current speed, he actually had a good chance of escaping within a day.

Understanding this, Tang Jie charged east as quickly as he could.