Madmen and Demons

The fireworks faded, and the sky returned to darkness again. The battlefield resumed its slaughter.

However, the soldiers fighting recklessly below, heedless of life and death, did not know that after this blossom of fireworks, the situation of this battle had quietly changed, with the attackers and defenders switching places.

When Li Shiyin held the Cherishing Star Sword and looked back at the other side, there were only four people left on the other side — all of them at the Golden Core realm.

With one move, Heavenly Flight, all the Foundation Establishment cultivators from Xuanqin had been crushed to death by the terrifying sword qi. Only the Golden Core cultivators survived under the sword qi.

The consumption of that one firework was four Foundation Establishment cultivators and one Golden Core cultivator.

This woman had directly confronted five of their Golden Core cultivators and four Foundation Establishment cultivators alone, and then in the confrontation, four Foundation Establishment cultivators and one Golden Core cultivator were directly crushed to death by her sword qi. This was unimaginable to Qing Yuan. Even the most outstanding genius of Cloud Heaven Sect, standing at the pinnacle of all geniuses, could not accomplish this... At least that person would have to be at the Golden Core realm to have a chance.

Not only could she hunt them down in the dark, but she could also face them directly in broad daylight.

"What kind of monster is this?" The thought emerged in Qing Yuan's mind again. He felt a hint of despair. Facing a Foundation Establishment cultivator, "Could she really be that kind of top genius who came back from Lingnan Immortal Sect?"

He thought that even in Lingnan Immortal Sect, she should be considered an outstanding genius.

Another burst of sword qi rose up, and the icy wind brought with it sword intent, hitting Qing Yuan in the face. His skin stung as if cut by the sword qi.

"Scatter and escape!" That senior brother suddenly shouted and issued new orders.

As soon as Qing Yuan heard this, he felt it made sense, because he actually wanted to escape too... Though he worried whether they could outrun the woman with her ghostly movement technique.

...With the senior brother's strategy of scattering to escape, they only needed one person to die.

He was very confident in his own movement technique. He believed he would definitely not be the one caught.

So as soon as the senior brother finished speaking, Qing Yuan turned into a ray of light and flew away.

Golden Core cultivators fleeing in terror from Foundation Establishment cultivators. What kind of bizarre humiliation was this? Oh right, this was nothing. Those who had cultivated in the world of cultivation for a long time did not care at all about such moral shame... Because those who had such moral awareness had already died early on.

As soon as the Cloud Heaven Sect disciple with the highest status shouted, four rays of light immediately shot out in four directions.

Watching those four escaping rays of light, Li Shiyin did not immediately give chase. She exhaled lightly, stabilizing the vigorous circulation of power within her body, then blood spilled from the corner of her mouth.

She was injured. She wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth with her hand.

After all, she was still just a Foundation Establishment cultivator.

There were limits to the Foundation Establishment realm.

She had killed ten of the fifteen Xuanqin cultivators within a short time, with five escaping; she had directly clashed blades with nine Xuanqin cultivators with Heavenly Flight. She had only sustained some internal injuries.

(Note: The original Heavenly Flight was Li Shiyin gathering all the power in her body, then amplifying it through the Stellar Guidance and War Soul techniques, finally attacking outward with sword qi. At that time, the sword qi manifestation was what Lu Junxing called the second stage of sword qi; now, Li Shiyin can already flexibly control the output of power.)

Li Shiyin was not a god, it was just that those Xuanqin cultivators were too terrified and had obviously deified her.

In fact, if Qing Yuan and the others did not flee and stayed to continue clashing with Li Shiyin, the outcome would not be certain.

Li Shiyin took healing and power-restoring pills, then glanced back at the shocked silly Li Shiwen on the city wall. She shook her head with a sigh, then followed one of the escaping cultivators.

The master said to take advantage when the enemy was weak and seize the opportunity to eliminate them. One must take the chance when the enemy was exhausted to decisively cut the grass and eliminate the root.

She wanted to beat those Xuanqin cultivators back in one go.

Zi Yi was the Nascent Soul cultivator sent by Cloud Heaven Sect this time to oversee the rear.

What did overseeing the rear mean?

It meant hanging a Nascent Soul senior's name here; he didn't need to make a move. His presence here was enough.

For Zi Yi, he was just changing locations to cultivate, then he would be allotted a large sum of spirit stones from the sect.

Because for matters between mortal kingdoms, large sects almost never directly intervened, only small sects would take action, but small sects did not have the strength for him to need to act, let alone those loose cultivators. The number of loose cultivators who could cultivate to the Nascent Soul stage was extremely small, and none would appear in a land with immortal legacies like this.

So Zi Yi had never thought he would need to take action in this battle...

Until a panicking, deranged disciple ran back crying loudly outside his cultivation chamber:

"Ghosts‽ Ghosts‽ Devils, it's a devil...!" "Darkness, sword qi, stars, corpses..."

"Nascent Soul, Foundation Establishment, mortals, Golden Core..."

"Ah hahaha, dead, dead! Dead again, exploded! Exploded again!"

"Golden Core, no match for Foundation Establishment!!"

It sounded wrong to him. He stopped cultivating, got up and went out, then controlled this deranged disciple.

"Peace." He pointed at the spot between this disciple's eyebrows, using his Nascent Soul realm control over souls to calm this disciple's mind and spirit.

This disciple had obviously been progressing too fast in his cultivation, yet his heart was too weak, generating inner demons.

"What is your name, what happened to all of you?" Zi Yi asked.

The disciple regained his senses. Seeing Zi Yi again, he hastily bowed in greeting. "Disciple Qing Ming. I greet Elder Zi Yi!"

"What happened to you?" Zi Yi asked again. "And the others?"

Qing Ming collected himself before replying, "An extremely horrifying Foundation Establishment sword cultivator came from North Chu. Her attainments in sword qi and intent are extremely high. She chased and killed us. We were completely outmatched. Disciple barely managed to escape alive."

"Foundation Establishment, sword qi, sword intent?" Hearing these clashing terms, Zi Yi glanced down at the disciple. Could he still be out of his mind?

"Everyone else is dead!" Qing Ming's voice trembled. "That sword qi that pierced heaven and earth, everyone would die from it!"

With that mentality, no wonder they couldn't even defeat a Foundation Establishment cultivator; Zi Yi looked down on Qing Ming in his heart.

"More than ten of you went, now all dead except for you who escaped?" He asked, actually not really believing Qing Ming's words.

"Yes!" Qing Ming lowered his head in acknowledgement.

"With your abilities, it wouldn't be your turn to escape..." Zi Yi was halfway through speaking when he suddenly perceived a powerful fluctuation of sword qi. He raised his head and gazed into the dark night...

There in the darkness, a star exploded open! Countless sword qi blossomed.

"What you said seems to be true." His mind shook as he murmured softly.

"Huh?" Qing Ming was stunned. He raised his head to look, and realized the Zi Yi before him had vanished.

He turned back again and saw in the darkness that bone-chilling purple sword qi once more. His body started trembling again.

"A devil, a devil has come chasing...!"