If they run into a hound of devouring spirit beasts, the delay will be even longer.
If Venerable Zhiyu gets lucky and breaks through to the Nascent Soul Transformation realm before the Spirit Venerates at the headquarters step in, not to mention how much trouble it will be to deal with this Nascent Soul Transformation cultivator after the myriad communications go through, he himself will definitely face severe punishment from the Spirit Venerates.
If he could, he would naturally rush back to the headquarters in person to report the news, but he cannot.
The headquarters has a long-standing explicit rule that the chief supervisor dispatched to the mortal realm is not allowed to take a single step out of the mortal realm before their 300-year term is up, and this rule is enforced with a forbidden curse directly planted in their divine sense.
The moment they step foot into a spirit-forbidden land, their souls will scatter and they will perish on the spot.
So even though this matter concerns his own cultivation level and even his very life, Venerable Gui Jia does not dare to return personally.
"Your subordinate obeys the order!" The subordinate immediately responded with a bow, turned to leave the dark chamber to carry out the task, only to suddenly realize he could not get out.
Outside the dark chamber, an unfamiliar barrier had completely sealed off the area.
This barrier was thick and solid, and the subordinate had no way to break through it. He turned around to go back and report to Venerable Gui Jia, but the moment he spun around, a person appeared right behind him!
He had not sensed the person's arrival at all!
"Who are you!" The subordinate yelped in alarm, about to summon his artifact to attack the sudden intruder, only to be stunned to find he could not circulate the spiritual power inside his body at all!
His spiritual power had been sealed.
There was no doubt that the person in front of him was the one who had done it. But when? How had he managed to silently and swiftly seal the spiritual power of this Golden Core cultivator without the latter noticing a single thing?
Even Venerable Gui Jia, who was already at the Nascent Soul realm, could not pull off such a feat!
How could a figure this powerful appear in this barren mortal realm?
"Huh, a Golden Core? So you're not the Nascent Soul Mid-Stage chief supervisor." Liao Pantu glanced at the subordinate, jotted something down on the jade slip in his hand, and chuckled, "Lucky me, I even got an extra little Golden Core as a bonus."
The commotion outside had alerted Venerable Gui Jia inside the dark chamber. He walked out just in time to see his subordinate looking shocked, even bewildered and at a complete loss, alongside a strange, ugly old man he had never met before.
In truth, Liao Pantu's features were actually fairly regular, but because he cultivated the Soul Refining Art, half of his face was pitch black, and only the other half looked normal, making his overall appearance rather eerie.
"Who are you!" Venerable Gui Jia was also confused. The isolation formation he had set up here was not some casual little array that cultivators of the same realm could easily blast apart with their spiritual power -- it was a proper, solid large array integrated with both isolation and defensive functions, laid down with a formation plate.
That formation plate was the classic model commonly used by the higher-ups of Myriad Connections, after all.
And everyone used it precisely because it was high-quality and extremely practical.
But now, someone had managed to get inside without making even the faintest sound! Venerable Gui Jia had an excellent memory, and he clearly remembered that he had never granted this ugly old man permission to enter the isolation formation!
Wait, where was his isolation formation?
Venerable Gui Jia looked around in astonishment, only to find that there was no trace of the Myriad Connections isolation formation outside at all. In its place was a flawless isolation barrier that had them all tightly trapped around the dark chamber.
Liao Pantu turned to look at him upon hearing the noise, and immediately grinned in delight, "Well now, Nascent Soul Mid-Stage. That must be you."
With that, he flicked his sleeve and pulled the Nascent Soul cultivator right in front of him, at the same time summoning a huge iron cage from his lock ring.
The speed was so fast that Venerable Gui Jia could not resist in the slightest, and before he knew it, he had been stuffed into the large iron cage.
Liao Pantu had planned for total surprise from the start. After all, his target was a Nascent Soul cultivator. If the man had been prepared to put up a fight, capturing him would have taken far more effort, and would never have been as easy as this.
Seeing that Venerable Gui Jia, a Nascent Soul Mid-Stage expert, had been locked up so effortlessly, the subordinate instantly understood how dire his situation was. He immediately turned and ran for his life as fast as he possibly could.
Liao Pantu was in no rush at all. He stood calmly in place, watching the man sprint two steps before the subordinate slammed headfirst into the surrounding barrier with a heavy thud. Then Liao Pantu casually reached out and tugged, and the man was zapped right into the large iron cage, successfully locked up together with his superior.
The iron cage was huge, more than spacious enough to hold two people.
Inside the cage, Venerable Gui Jia tried to blast the iron cage apart with his spells, only to find they did nothing at all. The moment his spells made contact with the iron bars of the cage, they dissipated into thin air.
His heart was filled with utter panic. He had no idea what kind of treasure this was, that it could completely neutralize the full-powered spells of a Nascent Soul cultivator like him.
The subordinate immediately joined Venerable Gui Jia in trying to blast the cage apart.
When their spells proved useless, they pulled out their artifacts to attack it instead.
The artifacts did not work either.
The iron cage was so sturdy that it did not budge an inch under the combined assault of one Nascent Soul and one Golden Core cultivator.
Liao Pantu was very pleased with the sight.
He had never expected the cage Lin Xiao made using Extinguishing Stones to turn out this well.
He was just curious how Lin Xiao had managed to actually refine artifacts out of Extinguishing Stones.
When he first heard Lin Xiao say he wanted to try this, Liao Pantu had thought the idea absurd. After all, Extinguishing Stones were known to devour spiritual energy, and every single thing cultivators did relied on the use of spiritual power -- artifact refinement was no exception.
Even the various tools used for artifact refinement had to be rich in spiritual energy. How could anyone possibly refine something made of Extinguishing Stones?
The moment you put an Extinguishing Stone into the mix, it would drain all the spiritual energy from the auxiliary materials, and even from the cultivator doing the refining. There was no way that could work.
Not to mention that Extinguishing Stones were extremely harmful to both cultivators and ordinary people. If you tried to craft something using them, the person using the finished product would surely have their spiritual power devoured, their essence blood sucked dry, and their lifespan drained away. How could anyone make such a harmful thing?
But back then, Lin Xiao had patted his chest and promised him that there would be no negative side effects at all. The final product would only retain the spiritual energy devouring trait, and it would only absorb spiritual energy inside the artifact, never harming anyone.
And the finished product standing before them now, the large iron cage holding Venerable Gui Jia and his subordinate, was exactly that. Lin Xiao had named it the Spirit-Binding Cage.
Liao Pantu had personally tested it back then. This Spirit-Binding Cage only slowly devours the spiritual energy inside the cage when it is activated and in use. When it is not in use, and is shrunk down to be stored in a storage bag or lock ring, it remains in a completely dormant state, and does not produce any effect at all.
The devouring effect is strongest on the cage bars themselves. That means as long as the cultivators locked inside do not directly touch the bars, their spiritual power will not be drained by much.
As for ordinary people, they will not be affected at all inside the cage. To them, it is just a perfectly ordinary large iron cage, not all that different from the wooden cages the local authorities use to transport prisoners.
Well, there is one small difference. The cages the local authorities use are usually made of wood.
villain is the number one simp for the book's leading female protagonist, Shen Wan'er. As expected, he later becomes a tool for the main character to show off and slap faces, ultimately meeting a tragic end with his family ruined and his life in shambles. Fortunately, he awakens the [Universal Pure Love System], which allows him to earn points by performing acts of pure love. To change his fate, Gu Yan makes a decisive choice to seek warmth and companionship with the book's biggest villain—Cold Qingqiu. ........... My name is Leng Qingqiu. To find the murderer who killed my parents years ago, I deliberately blinded myself so that everyone would lower their guard around me. Just as I was secretly accumulating power and capital according to my initial plan, a man walked into my world. "Lengleng, Qingqing, Qiuqiu, which nickname do you prefer?" I don't like any of them. You'd better leave quickly! "Why aren't you saying anything? How about I call you my baby wife?" Leng Qingqiu thinks to herself, this man is truly annoying! (Stubborn pure love warrior + single female lead + true pure love + 1v1)
e vast world of cultivation, where he becomes the master of the Heavenly Ruins Sacred Hall, a dying old man with barely a tenth of his former cultivation remaining. He is immediately confronted with a deadly crisis: his subordinates have rebelled, and his protectors are forcing him to abdicate. At the critical moment, the system descends from the heavens: [Ding! The host has been detected facing a life-or-death crisis. The system is now officially activated!] [As a gift, you have received the Supreme Beginner’s Pack and awakened the ultimate cheat: ten thousand years of pure cultivation essence every second!] Yin Tianjue: “Wait… ten thousand years of cultivation every second? That’s six hundred thousand years a minute, and in one day… I can’t even calculate it. Either way, I’m already invincible!” You’re a peerless prodigy rarely seen in ten thousand years? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. You’re an undying ancestor who has guarded a sacred land for countless ages? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. You’re the strongest chosen one, blessed with heaven-defying destiny? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. From this day forth, I have only one thing to say: “I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. Now, how exactly are you supposed to deal with that?”
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
