Chapter 345: Astonishing Retreat of a Tenth-Stage Demon

Chapter 345: Astonishing Retreat of a Tenth-Stage Demon

There were quite a few items in the storage bag.

However, what surprised Chu Ning was that there weren't many truly valuable items.

"After all, Qiu Qijun is the master of a small sect. It seems he didn't bring along his most precious possessions and left them within the sect instead."

Chu Ning made a silent guess.

Then, his gaze landed on a bracelet that looked extraordinarily ancient.

"Could this be the treasure Qiu Qijun obtained before?"

Chu Ning vaguely sensed an aura similar to that of ancient treasures emanating from it.

But when he tried to infuse it with his spiritual power, there was no response at all.

At this moment, Chu Ning tried to probe it with his spiritual sense, but still, there was no reaction.

"Master, let me try this."

Just as Chu Ning was feeling puzzled, Bai Ling's voice suddenly sounded.

She then transformed into the form of a young lady and appeared beside Chu Ning.

Chu Ning was slightly startled by her words.

"Why do you suddenly want to take a look at this bracelet?"

As he handed the bracelet to her, he asked with a puzzled expression.

Before this, Bai Ling had never shown any interest in any magical artifact.

"I don't know either. I just had an intuition that I'm very interested in this item."

Bai Ling took the bracelet from Chu Ning and put it on her wrist as she spoke.

Then, she infused it with her power, and in the next moment, a light blue glow appeared on the bracelet.

Bai Ling waved her hand down, and an extremely cold aura spread out.

On the sea below, within a hundred zhang radius, a layer of frost immediately appeared on the water.

"Oh!"

This scene caused both Chu Ning and Bai Ling to exclaim in surprise.

"Bai Ling, what's going on?"

Chu Ning even paused at this moment and asked Bai Ling.

Bai Ling blinked her eyes, staring at the ancient bracelet in her hand, her eyes revealing a hint of crystal clarity.

"This item is like the magical artifacts of human cultivators. It can actually be driven by my spiritual power."

At this moment, a look of surprise appeared on Bai Ling's face.

"Moreover, I can sense that it's not an ice attribute, but it can amplify the power of my spells several times over!"

"Oh?" Chu Ning was also astonished when he heard this.

He had never heard of an ancient treasure that could be driven by a spiritual beast but not by a cultivator.

At this moment, he said directly, "Then you can keep this item for now and study it slowly. See if it has any other functions."

As he spoke, Chu Ning looked ahead and said calmly, "We're about to reach the outer sea soon. Let's be careful. Come up onto this Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel to conserve some spiritual power."

As Chu Ning spoke, he infused his feet with spiritual power and stepped onto the Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel.

The wheel immediately expanded slightly, and Bai Ling gracefully landed on it.

Then, Chu Ning drove the Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel and flew forward.

As soon as he entered the outer sea, Chu Ning felt the chaotic spiritual energy there.

Even as he circulated his spiritual power, the speed at which he absorbed spiritual energy slowed down noticeably.

He glanced at Bai Ling beside him, and she didn't seem to be affected.

Spiritual beasts and demons seemed to have a natural difference in their ability to absorb this chaotic spiritual energy.

Upon hearing this, Chu Ning immediately understood why these great demons preferred to stay in the outer sea region.

"The end of the outer sea is the Boundless Sea. If I fly at my normal speed, it will take me almost a month to get there according to the information I got before.

But now with this Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel, it should take less than half a month to get out of the outer sea region.

I just hope that along the way, we'll encounter as few demons as possible."

As it turned out, Chu Ning's idea was good, but reality was not that ideal.

Less than a hundred li into the outer sea, a great demon appeared within Chu Ning's line of sight.

It had the head of a bird and the body of a demon—it was a Golden-Silver Bird, an eighth-stage demon.

"A human Golden Core cultivator?"

The Golden-Silver Bird's two silver eyes looked at Chu Ning, flashing with astonishment.

It never expected that under the current circumstances, a Golden Core cultivator would dare to appear in the outer sea.

Looking at this Golden-Silver Bird, Chu Ning was also slightly tempted.

Within his Golden Spirit Sword, there was also a Golden-Silver Bird spirit condensed.

But the Golden-Silver Bird he had before had just crossed the Tribulation of Lightning, and it was not a complete Golden-Silver Bird spirit.

If he were to kill this Golden-Silver Bird...

However, this thought had only turned in his mind for a moment before Chu Ning discarded it.

He would have other opportunities to find an eighth-stage demon beast spirit in the future.

But here in the outer sea, it was obviously not a place to casually kill eighth-stage demon beasts.

There were many eighth- and ninth-stage demon beasts in this area, and there were even tenth-stage demon beasts.

If he were to be targeted by these demon beasts, his death would be certain.

"Bai Ling!"

At this moment, Chu Ning transmitted his voice to Bai Ling, who was beside him.

After receiving his hint, Bai Ling's eyes narrowed slightly as she glared at the eighth-stage Golden-Silver Bird in front of her.

From her mouth came an extremely icy voice.

"Scram!"

"You..." The Golden-Silver Bird heard Bai Ling's voice and its eyes widened in anger, focusing on her.

In the next moment, however, its eyes were filled with shock.

At this moment, it suddenly sensed an aura that made it feel fearful.

"Tenth-stage!"

When it sensed the aura of a tenth-stage spiritual beast emanating from Bai Ling, the eighth-stage Golden-Silver Bird immediately turned and fled without another word.

A tenth-stage great demon was the most powerful existence in this boundless sea.

Among the demon race, the concept of hierarchical difference was even stronger than among human cultivators.

The territory of a tenth-stage demon beast was absolutely off-limits to other demon beasts.

And at this moment, it had actually dared to intercept a tenth-stage demon beast, which was absolutely a suicidal move.

This eighth-stage demon beast fled.

And from ten li away, a ninth-stage demon beast that was rushing towards this place, its almost-completely-transformed human face also flashed with a trace of fear at this moment.

Then, it immediately turned around and flew away.

Chu Ning's spiritual sense was powerful, and he naturally sensed this scene. He immediately relaxed.

The most important reason he dared to fly into this outer sea, even though the giant turtle had said that it should not be awakened unless it was a life-and-death situation, was Bai Ling's innate divine ability to simulate the aura of a high-stage demon beast.

This was purely the oppressive feeling brought on by a high-level aura.

If he hadn't known beforehand that Bai Ling was a fifth-stage spirit beast, he wouldn't have been able to tell.

"Master, I can maintain my innate divine ability for half a day after using it.

Let's go quickly, so we'll be safe for at least half a day."

Upon hearing Bai Ling's words, Chu Ning immediately transformed into a ray of white light and flew forward without hesitation.

It wasn't until long after Chu Ning and Bai Ling's figures had disappeared that the area finally stirred.

A hundred miles away, the Golden-Silver Bird reappeared, and beside it was a beast with a long fish tail and a human-shaped upper body.

"Golden-Silver, did you really see that tenth-stage senior just now?

Didn't all the seniors go to Snowpeak Mountain? Only one senior was left in the Boundless Sea, how could another tenth-stage senior suddenly appear?

Are you sure you didn't make a mistake?"

Hearing the fish beast's words, the Golden-Silver Bird shook its head, its eyes clouded with uncertainty.

Then, its silver eyes flashed with determination.

"Impossible to mistake, our spirit beasts are inherently sensitive to auras.

There's no way I could mistake a tenth-stage aura.

Moreover, the oppressive feeling from this senior's aura is even stronger than the others I've encountered."

The Golden-Silver Bird paused, then continued with a strange tone:

"This senior might very well be an ancient heavenly spirit beast!"

"An ancient heavenly spirit beast?" The fish beast exclaimed in surprise.

"Here in the North Cold, we've only heard of one heavenly spirit beast, the Primordial Abyss's Cang Xuan Spirit Turtle.

How could there be another tenth-stage heavenly spirit beast?"

After the fish beast finished speaking, the Golden-Silver Bird shook its head.

Then, it turned its bird head to look at the fish beast and said:

"Maybe this senior is just passing by. Should we inform Senior Jiaolong?"

"I think we should." The fish beast replied.

The Golden-Silver Bird nodded, and the two beasts flew away.

...

In the blink of an eye, Chu Ning had been flying in the outer sea for almost ten days.

During the first three days, he encountered eighth-stage or even ninth-stage beasts almost every day.

With Bai Ling's innate divine ability to simulate a tenth-stage beast's aura, they managed to scare off these beasts each time.

However, starting on the fourth day, as Chu Ning ventured deeper into the outer sea, he surprisingly encountered fewer beasts.

For six or seven days straight, they sailed smoothly without meeting a single beast.

Chu Ning found this a bit strange.

But then he thought again and felt it was normal.

Although there were said to be many beasts in the outer sea of the Boundless Sea, eighth-stage and ninth-stage beasts were comparable to Nascent Soul cultivators in terms of existence.

Naturally, there wouldn't be as many as the sixth or seventh-stage beasts.

Some eighth-stage beasts had entered the central sea region, so naturally, there might be relatively fewer in this outer sea region.

However, Chu Ning was happy with this situation.

Without any beasts blocking their way, his speed was fast, and in another five days, he would be able to completely fly out of the Boundless Sea region and enter the Infinite Sea realm.

If the giant turtle was to be believed, that place seemed even safer than the Boundless Sea.

After flying forward for a while longer, Chu Ning suddenly felt a very strange feeling, as if someone was staring at him.

"Someone's probing with their spiritual sense?"

Chu Ning suddenly realized something.

As he had been flying in the outer sea, he hadn't used the Spirit Concealment Art to block spiritual probes.

Even if he activated it himself, it wouldn't affect Bai Ling.

And if he put Bai Ling into the spirit beast bag, in case they encountered a powerful demon, when Bai Ling came out of the bag, the fluctuation of her spiritual power transforming into a human form could be sensed by the beasts, revealing her true cultivation level.

However, although Chu Ning didn't actively use the Spirit Concealment Art to block probes, the passive sensing effect of the art was still working.

At this moment, Chu Ning could vaguely sense that he was being probed, but he couldn't pinpoint the source of the spiritual sense.

There was only one possibility - the spiritual sense of the person probing was too strong, at least twice as strong as his own.

Thinking this, Chu Ning immediately stopped and used the contract sensing art to inform Bai Ling of his discovery.

The next moment, Bai Ling's pleasant yet cold voice echoed in the air.

"Fellow Daoist, since you're here, why don't you show yourself?"

Bai Ling didn't deliberately use her spiritual power, she just spoke normally.

As her voice fell, Chu Ning saw a beam of light flying towards them from a distance. In just a few breaths, it had already come within a hundred meters of them.

The newcomer wore a Daoist robe, had the face of a twenty-seven or twenty-eight-year-old youth, and looked like a cultivator. However, he exuded a faint demonic aura, especially his eyes, which were icy cold like a venomous snake.

"A tenth-stage demon!"

Seeing this figure, Chu Ning's heart sank slightly.

He didn't speak at this moment, instead leaving it to Bai Ling to handle.

"I heard that a tenth-stage Daoist has appeared in this outer sea, and it's possible that it's a heavenly spirit beast.

I'm not talented, but I came to introduce myself."

The cold-eyed demon's gaze swept over Chu Ning and Bai Ling, lingering on Bai Ling.

He could naturally tell that Chu Ning was a human cultivator, but the aura exuded by Bai Ling was something he couldn't see through.

"Fellow Daoist has seen me now!"

Along with Bai Ling's slightly cold voice, an oppressive tenth-stage aura emerged from her once again.

Sensing Bai Ling's aura, the tenth-stage demon, who was in the form of a man, also flashed a strange look on his face.

"I don't know your esteemed name, Fellow Daoist. I didn't know there was such a figure as you here in the North Cold."

"I don't cultivate in the North Cold." Bai Ling looked at the tenth-stage demon before her, her face calm.

"I just happened to pass by here on my way through the North Cold."

"Oh!" The demon's eyes revealed a look of realization, then his gaze shifted to Chu Ning.

"That is our private matter, and you need not concern yourself with it.

I am merely passing through and have no intention of harming your kind. Do you intend to obstruct me?"

"I wouldn't dare to obstruct you." The man smiled faintly, the coldness in his eyes softening a little.

"However, I am but a frog in a well, residing in the North Cold. I have always admired fellow cultivators from other regions.

May I ask where you are from, fellow cultivator? I would be honored to learn from you."

Hearing the man's words, Chu Ning's heart sank.

Bai Ling's innate ability to simulate a powerful aura was indeed formidable, but she was only a fifth-stage beast.

If they were to engage in a fight and their true strength was exposed, the man would surely kill them both.

"Turtle Elder!"

Chu Ning tried to reach out to the spirit beast pouch, hoping to communicate with the Cang Xuan Spirit Turtle.

However, there was no response, causing Chu Ning's heart to sink further.

Bai Ling, on the other hand, maintained her calm demeanor, her clear eyes meeting the man's cold gaze with an air of arrogance.

She replied with three words:

"Not interested."

The cold-eyed young man's face twisted into a mocking smile at her response.

"Whether you're interested or not is not for you to decide. I'll kill your human friend first, and then we'll see if you're still uninterested!"

As his words landed, the man transformed into a dazzling streak, rushing towards them.

Chu Ning's expression changed, and he quickly pulled out an object from his storage bag, holding it up as a shield.

It was a massive turtle shell.

Among Chu Ning's treasures, this was one of the few items that might have a chance against a tenth-stage beast comparable to a Nascent Soul cultivator.

He believed that only this turtle shell could provide some protection.

"Oh?"

The cold-eyed young man exclaimed in surprise at the sight of the turtle shell.

He halted thirty feet away, his gaze fixed on the shell.

Sensing the man's reaction, Chu Ning lowered the shell slightly.

The young man was staring at the turtle shell in his hand, his face filled with astonishment.

"This is..."

There was a hint of uncertainty in the young man's voice as he asked, "The shell of the Cang Xuan Spirit Turtle?"

Chu Ning and Bai Ling exchanged a glance, their contractual connection allowing them to sense each other's thoughts.

Bai Ling was about to speak when the young man's gaze shifted to her.

His eyes widened as he noticed the bracelet on her wrist, now glowing with an icy blue light after she had channeled a bit of her power into it.

"A spirit-linked treasure!"

The young man's exclamation caused both Chu Ning and Bai Ling to pause.

"You actually recognize this treasure. I'm impressed by your knowledge," Bai Ling said, a hint of pride creeping into her voice.

The coldness in the young man's eyes faded, and his tone even held a hint of envy as he replied, "A spirit-linked treasure, crafted by ancient Yaozu masters for heavenly spirit beasts. Only the Yaozu can wield such treasures.

I've heard that these treasures are extremely rare in this realm, far less common than the ancient treasures of human cultivators.

I never expected to have the fortune of seeing one today."

The young man's gaze returned to Bai Ling as he continued, "May I ask where you are from, fellow cultivator? You possess a spirit-linked treasure and even have the shell of the Cang Xuan Spirit Turtle.

As far as I know, that turtle has been living in the Primordial Abyss for countless years."

"My origins are none of your concern," Bai Ling replied, her face still cold and proud.

"I came to the North Cold to borrow the turtle's shell temporarily. I have no interest in fighting you."

Bai Ling turned to Chu Ning and waved her hand, ordering, "Let's go!"

Chu Ning was about to activate the Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel to escape when the young man called out again, "Wait!"

"Do you intend to stop me?" Bai Ling's face darkened with anger.

The young man shook his head, "I wouldn't dare. With your spirit-linked treasure, I know I'm no match for you.

However, I have a request."

Before Bai Ling could ask, the young man quickly continued, "Our Yaozu is currently at war with human cultivators. All my companions have gone to the Snowpeak Mountains, except for me.

You must have also encountered human cultivators since you came from the Primordial Abyss.

Why don't we join forces and head to the Snowpeak Mountains to kill those human cultivators?

We can show them the might of ancient Yaozu spirit beasts and the treasures we possess. You can even choose any treasure you desire."

"Not interested," Bai Ling replied coldly.

Without another word, Chu Ning activated the Eight Trigrams Flying Wheel, and they swiftly fled into the distance.

The young man's eyes flickered with indecision, his face bearing a disappointed expression.

Finally, he let them go, but he muttered to himself, "I wonder who that cultivator is. At first, I thought they were just disguising their aura.

But the fact that they could sense me and possess a spirit-linked treasure proves their authenticity.

That turtle shell is also not something they could have obtained easily. None of the tenth-stage beasts in the North Cold have the means to do so.

He muttered to himself, his face clouded with confusion.

"But why didn't they fly away themselves? Oh, I see, they're heading toward the Boundless Sea."

The young man's confusion cleared, and he realized, "She must be conserving her spiritual power to cross the Boundless Sea!

It seems I should also leave this North Cold region. The outside world might be even more fascinating than I imagined."

After his soliloquy, the young man's gaze returned to the Snowpeak Mountains.

"But for now, it's time to teach those human cultivators a lesson for daring to challenge the Yaozu!

Let chaos reign in the North Cold!"

(End of Chapter)

Chapter end