Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-134

"Top-grade mystic instrument!"

Yuan Shi-Kong was shocked and hurriedly cast the crystal hexagonal shield behind him whilst frantically supplying his arcane energy into the shield.

However, it was too late as the top-grade flying sword pierced right through the shield that was hastily put up. Then, Yuan Shi-Kong’s energy shield, a signature ability for Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivators, was also torn apart quickly.

Fortunately for Yuan Shi-Kong, the two layers of protection managed to stall the Verdant Dawn Sword's attack.

Hence, Yuan Shi-Kong was eventually able to dodge the sword and avoid it hitting his vital points. Whilst the flying sword sliced across his abdomen, his life was not in danger.

Yuan Shi-Kong immediately raised his hand towards the sky.

A blinding red light was shot up a thousand feet high exploded, it was a distress signal!

After that, Yuan Shi-Kong turned around and saw a giant sea turtle swimming toward him with a young cultivator standing on its shell.

"It's you!" Yuan Shi-Kong exclaimed in astonishment.

How could Yuan Shi-Kong ever forget this young man who had left a deep impression in his life.

Five years ago, this young man who was only a Third Layer Blood Condensation Realm back then, actually escaped from his pursuit. This incident turned him into a laughing stock in the Ocean Overturning Gang.

Lu Ping smiled at the frightened Yuan Shi-Kong.

Yuan Shi-Kong saw Lu Ping's strange smile and a chill suddenly arose in his heart, he immediately looked up and saw that a huge iron seal was already crashing down on him from above.

"How can this be!"

Yuan Shi-Kong was so frightened that his face turned pale like a sheet of blank paper.

Yuan Shi-Kong couldn’t believe that this puny Fifth Layer Blood Condensation Realm could cast one top-grade, and two high-grade mystic instruments, at the same time. Just how much arcane energy was needed to support these three mystic instruments at the same time?

A crystal bowl suddenly appeared in Yuan Shi-Kong's hand, and he held it upwards. Seawater flowed out from the bowl and transformed into a giant hand middair, which was able to steadily block Landslide in its tracks.

However, Yuan Shi-Kong himself spurted out a mouthful of blood from below due to overusing arcane energy and from the flaring up of his previous injuries inflicted by Lu Ping.

This person also has a top-grade mystic instrument. Lu Ping looked at the crystal bowl in Yuan Shi-Kong's hand and smiled playfully, However, he has obviously just refined the crystal bowl and not yet fully mastered it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be so difficult for him to use it with his cultivation base.

The Verdant Dawn Sword turned around and slashed at Yuan Shi-Kong's arm which was holding the crystal bowl.

Yuan Shi-Kong quickly raised his arm and a stream of current diverged from the crystal bowl, knocking the Verdant Dawn Sword off course. However, the giant water hand stopping Landslide’s descent began to shake from a sudden drop in arcane energy supporting it.

Yuan Shi-Kong arcane energy was stirred and he spat out another mouthful of blood.

"Let's see how much blood you can bleed!"

Lu Ping noticed that Yuan Shi-Kong had lost the ability to fight back, and could only use the top-grade mystic instrument in his hand to fend off the Verdant Dawn Sword's attacks.

Suddenly, two cultivators rose from the tiny island a few miles away and flew towards the direction where Lu Ping and Yuan Shi-Kong were fighting.

Yuan Shi-Kong's face immediately turned ecstatic. Lu Ping immediately knew that more enemies were coming.

So, it seemed that the tiny island was the Furious Sea Division’s secret base, or maybe even the entire Ocean Overturning Gang’s secret base.

Lu Ping was fighting with a top-grade mystic instrument and a high-grade mystic instrument which pushed him to his limits.

Seeing that Yuan Shi-Kong could only passively defend under his attacks, it was only a matter of time before he fell. However, Lu Ping didn’t expect that Yuan Shi-Kong’s helpers would arrive so quickly.

Lu Ping quietly cursed in his heart. He used his right thumb and made a cut on his index finger.

Then, three mid-grade needle-like mystic instruments appeared in Lu Ping's right hand. Lu Ping raised his hand and the three bloodied needles flew straight towards Yuan Shi-Kong's chest.

Yuan Shi-Kong panicked and gritted his teeth as he placed his crystal shield, which had been pierced by the Verdant Dawn Sword, in front of him.

The three flying needles struck the crystal shield and suddenly exploded, completely destroying the crystal shield and sending mystic instrument shards flying in all directions.

Although Yuan Shi-Kong tried his best to dodge and even used the water from the crystal bowl to form a water shield to protect himself, he still received several cuts from the exploding mystic instruments.

Just as Yuan Shi-Kong was secretly glad that he had escaped from the claws of death yet again, the Soaring Wing Swords suddenly flew out from the sea behind him and slashed silently.

By the time Yuan Shi-Kong noticed the flying swords, he found his own body sliced into three pieces.

"Stop!"

"How dare you!"

The two Ocean Overturning Gang Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivators, who were travelling at full speed, were already close but were still not in time to prevent Yuan Shi-Kong's death. So, the two men shouted out loud in anger.

Lu Ping mockingly looked at the two cultivators who were arriving. He seized Yuan Shi-Kong's interspatial pouch and mystic instrument in his hands, and landed on the Verdant Luan's back.

Lu Qin gave a long chirp, and with a flap of its wings, flew a few hundred feet away.

The Ocean Overturning Gang cultivators tried to catch up with Lu Ping, but the distance between them only grew further and further as time went on.

In the end, the two cultivators could only watch and mourn helplessly in vain, as the young man and bird disappeared towards the horizon.

Lu Ping, on the other hand, was happily playing with the crystal bowl he seized from Yuan Shi-Kong.

The name of this top-grade mystic instrument was Cold Jade Glazed Bowl. It was made from a whole piece of Cold Jade, and it was very suitable for Lu Ping to use.

The only drawback was that whilst this mystic instrument was capable of both offensive and defensive, it wasn’t remarkable in either aspect.

There was also the token Yuan Shi-Kong used to initiate the long-distance teleportation formation.

The hexagonal-shaped jade token was engraved with a resplendent palace on one side and a raging sea on the other, with the huge waves holding up a huge character for "Fury"!

As for the rest, such as spirit stones, spirit materials, mystic instruments, and other miscellaneous items, Lu Ping casually threw into his own interspatial ring. Yuan Shi-Kong was a Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivator, so he was naturally considerably wealthy.

Among his possessions, there was a medicinal pellet recipe that particularly piqued Lu Ping’s interest. He planned to study it once he returned to his cave-dwelling.

Lu Ping rode on the Verdant Luan and first traveled east for a few hundred miles before turning north.

On the way, he would stop at every island he saw to make purchases in the island markets.

A month later, Lu Ping had passed through dozens of islands of all shapes and sizes, controlled by independent clans who were similar in strength to smaller sects, such as the Yu Jian Sect and Ling Gu Sect.

He finally returned to Zhen Ling Sect.

On a small island called Xuan Lei Island, Lu Ping presented the Zhen Ling Sect's identity token to the cultivator stationed there. Through the teleportation formation on the island, he arrived at Di Chen Island, one of the 36 medium-sized islands under the control of Zhen Ling Sect.

In Di Chen Island’s market, Lu Ping spent thousands of spirit stones to buy some 500-year spirit herbs from various spirit herb stores.

After that, he travelled straight to Di Kun Island through a teleportation formation.

In Zhen Ling Sect, only medium-sized islands and above were allowed to teleport between each other. Small islands’ teleportation formations were only linked to the medium-sized islands they belonged to.

After five years had passed, Di Kun Island had become much more prosperous, with the entire market having expanded by one third. There was a constant stream of cultivators and the occasional Enlightened Master that flew past in the sky.

Although he was prepared, Lu Ping was still surprised by the huge changes on Huang Li Island. However, he didn’t stop and flew directly towards his own cave-dwelling which was situated in the middle of the island.

Five years have come and gone. Lu Ping couldn’t help but wonder what his cave-dwelling had become, and whether the spirit veins inside his cave-dwelling had been discovered.

Before he left, he had set 108 mid-grade spirit stones in the Ice Age Slaughtering Array’s formation chassis. That should be enough for the array formation to operate for ten years. Of course, this was only if the array formation was not attacked.

As he drew closer and closer to the cave-dwelling, Lu Ping noticed a pale blue light from the array formation, indicating that it was still operating. He felt a sense of relief, "Fortunately, the cave-dwelling has not been invaded."

But suddenly, Lu Ping frowned, and slowly approached a small forest diagonally in front of the cave-dwelling.

Lu Ping’s divine sense spread out. There was a show that was transpiring in front of his cave-dwelling and he had come back just in time to see it.

......

"Hu Lili, don't think too highly of yourself just because you have Liu Zi-Yuan backing you. Lu Ping has disappeared for five years. To put it nicely, he is missing; but we all know that he is as good as dead. I'm afraid that even his body has been swallowed by monsters, without a single bone remaining. According to the sect's rules, the sect has the right to take back the cave-dwellings of those who have been missing for more than five years. Are you defying the sect's rules by repeatedly obstructing our law enforcement members?"

The person who spoke was Li Yu, the son of Li Zi-Ming. After five years, this brat had actually advanced into the Blood Condensation Realm and was in the Third Layer Blood Condensation Realm.

Next to him were also Lu Ping's old acquaintances.

The first one was Li Cheng, who was now in the Fourth Layer Blood Condensation Realm.

There was also Lin Sheng, who had reached the Fifth Layer Blood Condensation Realm.

Lu Ping looked at these three men and the half a dozen Zhen Ling Sect disciples behind them, stood in front of his cave-dwelling negotiating with another party.

The group were holding mystic instruments in their hands and seemed to be preparing to break the Ice Age Slaughtering Array, that was protecting the cave-dwelling, by force.

The other party blocking these people was Hu Lili, Chen Lian and Lu Ping's manager, Fang Tao.

After several years, Hu Lili's cultivation base had broken through to the Mid Blood Condensation Realm and had reached the Fourth Layer Blood Condensation Realm.

Chen Lian had reached the Sixth Layer Blood Condensation Realm and finally surpassed Lu Ping in his cultivation progress.

Seeing this, Lu Ping couldn’t help but feel speechless at the difficulty of cultivating the [North Ocean Wave Listening Scripture].

Hu Lili laughed coldly, "Li Yu, don't think I don't know what you guys are thinking. Although the sect has this rule, there are many sect cultivators who have been gone for longer than the five years rule, but the sect still isn’t eager to take back their cave-dwellings. Why is that? What's more, Lu Ping's cave-dwelling is still set up outside of Tian Ling Mountain, he didn’t take up space there. You guys are just greedy for Lu Ping's cave-dwelling."

At this point, Li Cheng suddenly said from the side, "Senior Sister Hu, you're not making sense. We are just following the rules of the sect, not against Senior Brother Lu Ping. After all, Senior Brother Lu has been missing for more than five years, and has not been seen alive or dead.

"We have delayed the enforcement of this rule for more than half a year because we respect Senior Sister Hu and Master Immortal Liu. But this can’t go on forever, the cave-dwelling has to be put to good use, doesn't it? Besides, after the sect claims back the cave-dwelling, it still belongs to the sect. How can you say that we are greedy for his cave-dwelling?"

Hu Lili was so angry that she couldn’t even muster up a reply, Chen Lian spoke instead, "Since you are working according to the sect rules, how come when Master Immortal Liu was here, you guys didn't come to recover the cave-dwelling? But now that Master Immortal Liu took Yao Yong, Du Feng, Zhong Jian and others out on a sea patrol, you guys couldn't wait to come and take the cave-dwelling. This is really hilarious!"

Chen Lian's words embarrassed the trio and made them turn red. Li Yu didn’t care anymore and said directly, "No matter what, we have a reason to enforce the sect rules. Let’s trash this array formation first and talk later."

After he said that, he waved at the several Blood Condensation Realm cultivators behind him and commanded them to attack the Ice Age Slaughtering Array.

Just as the disciples put up their mystic instruments and were ready to attack, they suddenly heard a teasing voice in their ears, "Oh, and I was wondering just how did you all know that I was coming back today and rushed here to visit me! What a coincidence! Unfortunately, my cave-dwelling is not generous enough to accommodate the two Junior Brother Li’s, Junior Martial Brother Lin and the rest of you scums."