Chapter 141

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Chapter 141: Xu Fan’s Dedication to Training His Apprentice into Sha Diao

A fifth layer of Qi Refinement clawed giant wolf appeared before Si Ruoyu.

‘Awooo~~’

The giant wolf, as big as an adult tiger, lunged at Si Ruoyu.

“The start of the challenge is always the most boring part.”

Si Ruoyu immediately commanded the giant shield puppet to charge forward, while the spear puppets waited for the right moment and struck, quickly taking down the clawed giant wolf with a single thrust.

The giant wolf’s body vanished.

Then, two more identical clawed giant wolves appeared in the same spot.

The giant shield puppet continued to engage them.

As time went on, the number of wolves increased, and Si Ruoyu’s expression grew more serious.

By now, Si Ruoyu had thirty puppets around her, while the number of giant wolves had risen to one hundred.

“Just a hundred clawed giant wolves. You see, it hasn’t even reached the limit yet,” Xu Fan said with a smile.

“After this, I’m not betting with Master anymore,” Li Xingci said lightly, suddenly remembering Xu Fan’s past interest in divination when he was younger.

“You’re such a dull disciple,” Xu Fan shook his head.

The two continued to watch Si Ruoyu’s trial in the copy.

Under Si Ruoyu’s precise command, the hundred clawed giant wolves were split into groups of ten and then wiped out one by one.

The number of clawed giant wolves began to increase by tens, eventually reaching two hundred, and beads of sweat started to form on Si Ruoyu’s forehead.

After holding out against 340 wolves, Si Ruoyu, mentally exhausted, withdrew from the trial illusion, matching the exact number Xu Fan had predicted.

Seeing this, Li Xingci was even more determined never to bet with Xu Fan again.

“Xingci, I guessed this without using divination techniques,” Xu Fan said with a grin, emphasizing that he hadn’t relied on divination but had calculated it with grapes.

“Hmm, I trust Master,” Li Xingci replied.

At that moment, the burly figure of Xiong Li appeared on screen.

“Let’s make another bet. If you lose, you’ll help me raise a pet,” Xu Fan teased mischievously.

“No,” Li Xingci said flatly; no matter how Xu Fan tried to persuade him, he simply wouldn’t bet.

“Alright then.”

In the video, Xiong Li had entered tank-crushing mode; the sixth layer of Qi Refinement giant tiger couldn’t even scratch him.

Li Xingci watched Xiong Li’s performance on the screen with satisfaction, knowing that with such outstanding disciples in the sect, greatness was inevitable.

Outside the Hidden Spirit Sect’s trial tower, hundreds of disciples gathered, all staring in shock at the screen displaying the event.

“Si Senior Sister was already incredible earlier; I didn’t expect there would be even tougher senior brothers.”

“Xiong Li is probably the strongest fighter among us disciples.”

“Don’t speak too soon; there might be even more impressive senior brothers coming up.”

Among the crowd, a disciple wrapped in a small snake sighed as he watched the screen. For a practitioner of the Beast Taming Technique, this was the weakest phase, when their spirit beast hadn’t yet matured.

Outside the trial tower, Li Xuandao watched the scene on the screen and pondered many thoughts.

“This level of illusion is almost indistinguishable from the real world, and those two disciples will surely grow into big shots in the future.”

“In the flourishing path to immortality in the Thousand Worlds, disciples with war command talent are highly sought after by all major sects. I never expected our sect to have one.”

As he thought, he suddenly realized the potential of this sect was truly astonishing—there was a being who seemed to be a reincarnated great being, along with several disciples who could become big shots in the future. The sect even had various advanced educational methods, and importantly, its intelligent center would guide each disciple’s future development.

With an environment akin to a family, every disciple felt a strong sense of belonging.

This sect might develop into a prominent sect in the Immortal Realm in the future.

On the screen, Xiong Li, who had already challenged five hundred beasts, withdrew from the copy world with a wave of his hand. At that moment, everyone observing surged into the trial in the copy.

They had suffered enough from the challenge puppets and were eager to let off some steam.

Now, among the new generation of disciples in the Hidden Spirit Sect, the most troublesome thing was the level puppet challenges in the trial tower. This made the originally easy training of the Five Elements Technique feel useless; if one couldn’t progress quickly, it was pure suffering.

So now, all disciples of the Hidden Spirit Sect were refining their spiritual energy, purifying and purifying again.

The puppets in the trial tower would defeat you using your strongest techniques. When you advanced from the sixth layer of Qi Refinement to the seventh layer, a puppet specifically designed to exploit all your weaknesses would appear—then your nightmare would truly begin.

These were the words of a disciple from the Hidden Spirit Sect with exceptional battle talent, who recalled the efforts he had put in to overcome that puppet, leaving him so touched that he shed tears.

At this time, Xu Fan and Li Xingci faced dozens of screens, some of which displayed live footage of challenges against the trial tower’s puppets.

“This upgrade challenge puppet is a bit weaker than the ones I faced back then.”

“They are quite fortunate,” Li Xingci remarked.

“You all learned directly from me, so you couldn’t possibly be that far off.”

“Now I have less time to teach disciples directly; I can only provide this kind of exam-oriented education. Although it’s not as good as my hands-on teaching, it makes up for it in bulk quantity.”

“In the future, our sect will only accept elites, and then we’ll establish another Hidden Spirit Sect in the Immortal Realm,” Xu Fan said with a laugh, presenting a perfect plan.

“I will work hard for that day,” Li Xingci replied lightly.

Seeing his serious disciple, Xu Fan sighed. It seemed he had a long way to go to turn his disciple into a Sha Diao. He thought he needed to look into whether there were any beasts with the Sha Diao attribute in the cultivation world after returning; he had to find a few to raise beside his disciple.

……………………

In the celestial tool space of the Dragon Immortal Palace, Ye Xiaoyao sat surrounded by senior disciples of the Sword King Sect, attentively listening to the teachings of Respected Elder Panling.

“With this level, you could only reach the quasi-immortal level in the Thousand Worlds. You’re too stubborn, fixated on that one standard template for cultivating toward the Dao. That’s the least promising path,” Old Sword complained in Ye Xiaoyao’s mind.

Originally engrossed, Ye Xiaoyao gradually regained his focus.

“Isn’t Old Sword’s standard template for cultivation correct?” Ye Xiaoyao asked.

“It’s precisely because it’s too correct that many cultivators follow this pattern, leaving less and less of their own unique understanding of the ‘Dao.’ Eventually, after reaching a certain level, they will no longer progress an inch.”

“Even the most talented among them will at most become a true immortal.”

“I know this might sound distant, but it can prevent you from going astray.”

“You are destined to slay the Great Immortal Emperor someday; how can you settle for learning such things?” Old Sword advised him in his mind.

Ye Xiaoyao’s heart sank, and he instantly felt as though he lacked any pursuit in life.

Every time he heard Old Sword mention slaying the Great Immortal Emperor, it gave him a headache. After wandering through the cultivation world for so long, he understood his own qualifications well—he was merely exceptional, extraordinary by a small margin compared to the prodigies of those top sects.

To say nothing of distant examples, just among the brothers he knew, if Xu Fan reached the Nascent Soul Stage, he could likely suppress him with ease.

“You’re feeling down again. I guess I should bring up this topic less often in the future. Once you ascend to the Thousand Worlds and help me come back to life, we can settle our karmic ties.”

“I’ll keep looking for the next chosen one. My start wasn’t much better than yours. Since I’ve picked you, you’ve got a shot at making it big.”

Just as Old Sword was about to rant more, Ye Xiaoyao quickly stopped him in his thoughts. After decades together, he knew Old Sword inside out.

“Sky Sword Immortal Emperor, I messed up.”

“I shouldn’t have lost my fighting spirit.”

Ye Xiaoyao quickly used his go-to apology tactic, knowing Old Sword wouldn’t let it go otherwise.

“Let’s start with a small target: crafting a thousand fifth-grade precious artifacts, the Five Elements Spiritual Swords. You’re close to the Transformation Stage, so it’s time to gather materials for the Dao tools,” Old Sword said, pleased with Ye Xiaoyao’s apology.

“Got it,” Ye Xiaoyao replied, then gave his artifact master brothers a pitiful look.

“Brother Ye, what’s up?” the young artifact crafter asked, noticing Ye Xiaoyao’s odd expression.

“Nothing, just take care of yourself. You’ve got a long road ahead,” Ye Xiaoyao said.

“Hmm,” the young artifact crafter thought his Big Brother was nudging him to study harder.

A day later, after Respected Elder Panling finished his teachings, the space of the celestial tool opened countless gates. They had reached the border between Moliang State and Xiangzhou.

At that moment, outside the defense line, they faced an endless wave of the beast race, with creatures swarming the skies, the ground, and even underground.

In the sky, hundreds of massive warships stretched across the horizon, unleashing powerful attacks against the incoming beasts.

Inside the defense line, thousands of giant cannons were firing at full capacity.

The defense line was slowly giving ground.

Just then, the communication artifacts of all the newly arrived cultivators buzzed at once, each detailing the urgent need to join the fight and their assigned defense positions.

“Friend Zhang, I’m at the 1648 defense line of the Li Character Camp,” Ji Muhua said, bringing along his brothers from the same camp.

“I’m right next to you, at the 1649 defense line of the Li Character Camp,” Xu Gang quickly replied.

“No time to waste; let’s move,” Xu Yuexian urged.

Xu Yuexian grabbed Qianyun Lian and flew toward the Li Character Camp, as they all had the defense line maps from earlier.

The 1649 defense line of the Li Character Camp wasn’t the main target of the beast race’s assault, but it was still under heavy pressure. The defensive array underground had already been breached by the rat demons.

A Void Refiner was holding back the underground rat demons. Watching the defense line steadily retreat, his gaze shifted toward the central camp.

“Hold on a little longer! We just got word that reinforcements are coming to our camp. Stand your ground!”

The voice of the Void Refinement stage cultivator echoed across the entire 100-mile stretch of the 1649 Li Character Camp defense line.

“Brothers, we can hold out a bit longer! Think about the points and rewards from the Elder Council—pull out all your hidden tricks!”

“If we die, we lose everything!” the commander of the main camp shouted.

As soon as he finished speaking, the sky lit up with countless beams of sword light and techniques of the Dao.