Chapter 319

Chapter 319: Wherever I Go, I Shake the Ground

The Dragon Pavilion stands at the top of the thirty-six mansions.

Li Hui sneaked inside, taking just two hours to completely scavenge it clean.

Inside, danger lurked at every turn because the pavilion’s owner had once cultivated Dao soldiers, and even today many Dao soldiers still guarded the cave. They would kill anyone who intruded, and even true disciples entering would have only a slim chance of survival.

While the Haotu Sect’s ordinary practitioners were out honing their skills, they couldn’t possibly explore the Dragon Pavilion deeply. Even if some elders from the All-Manifestation Realm had thick skin, they had agreed to use these caves to cultivate disciples and were reluctant to go back on their word under mutual checks and balances.

It was under these circumstances that the inner sect leader Li Yingjun arrived.

The numbers of Dao soldiers didn’t matter much; they couldn’t stop him because he was fast! He wasn’t there to compete in arena fights and wouldn’t take risks to collect Dao soldiers. He only gathered valuable items and decided to sneak into the treasury, discovering many items had expired. Anyone strong enough to break in would surely feel cheated!

Of course, anyone who entered after him would find themselves in a worse position…

After leaving the Dragon Pavilion and heading towards the Thunder Swamp Imperium, Li Hui chose this cave because it often experienced thunder and lightning. He quickly explored the area; while not disappointed, he wasn’t particularly thrilled either.

There were no formation barriers, and no Dao soldiers guarding it. The Haotu Sect disciples had explored the Thunder Swamp too many times, only managing to dig up a hundred pounds of black tribulation soil, which could help Ao Chonglin in his training, but it was far from expectations!

Thinking along these lines for other caves, he made Song Zining take along a spirit talisman for a quick trip without raising the expectations too high.

Thus, Li Hui cast aside the thirty-six mansions and focused on eighteen secret realms. These realms were places where true disciples honed themselves, requiring at least the Initial Condense Essence Stage to enter. However, he was unfazed, waiting for no one to step onto the teleportation array before he thundered down into the Fire Bearer’s Inferno, said to be deep within the crust beneath the Haotu Sect.

Stepping out of the teleportation array, he immediately felt an incredible heat.

All around him was a dim reddish hue, with thick black smoke billowing, and the air filled with a pungent smell.

Li Hui took out a six-foot-tall talisman flag, which was three feet wide at the flag surface. The flagpole, made from Fire Cloud Ironwood, had a sharp tip.

He inserted the flagpole into the ground, planting one every ten steps. Before long, he surrounded the teleportation array with flags, totaling three hundred sixty.

Moments later, he released spirit talismans, quickly forming an array that floated up.

Using the talisman array as a guide, the more than three hundred flags fluttered in the wind, drawing in heat from all directions and creating a line of lava fire along the ground that climbed up the flagpoles, lighting up large symbols on the flags.

Once all the symbols on the flags lit up, Li Hui took out the Ice Picking Short Sword of the Cold Armor Emperor and inserted it at a specific array position.

With a light “puff,” the black smoke around the teleportation array dispersed, the heat diminished, and the dim red hue faded, leaving the air cool with just a gentle warm breeze.

After waiting for a while, Li Hui felt unsatisfied and began to dig deeper into the Inferno, continuing to place flags.

Whenever the edges of the flag surfaces displayed fire cloud patterns and all lit up, it proved the flags were successfully refined, prompting him to switch them out quickly. Once the Ice Picking Short Sword absorbed enough fire energy, he took the ancient golden crow’s eye, tossing it into the array to devour the Inferno’s lava alongside the flags.

After sweeping for an hour, he encountered fire energy ahead, and Li Hui quickly placed a decree within the flag array. When he faced powerful fire toxins, he began to switch out flags. No matter the situation, he always had a way to cope.

“Ha ha, professional lung clearing, guaranteed to prevent relapse for a hundred years!” he wandered around the Inferno, and whenever he spotted a massive figure from a distance, he didn’t linger and swiftly retracted his flags.

Since it was called the Fire Bearer’s Inferno, fire bears naturally existed there. These big beasts were in between spiritual beasts and demonic beasts, with tempestuous tempers and strong territorial instincts; once adult, their strength rivaled Condensed Essence Stage practitioners.

“No rush in slaughtering bears; the feast must wait until the end. With such abundant spiritual energy, there should be a Miao Jade vein in the bear den. The Haotu Sect has grand ambitions; since they have disciples who can decipher secret realms, they wouldn’t be so stingy, right?”

If the elders from various factions heard his thoughts, they’d likely slap him, pointing fingers to scold, “You brat, only good at picking up cheap deals!”

To be honest, such opportunities weren’t easy to seize; Li Hui occasionally set up talisman arrays as traps or for emergencies.

When the Inferno was no longer blazing, he charged towards the bear den with his Golden Silk Ring Knife, beginning his arduous training.

For three days and nights, Li Hui slaughtered twenty-five fire bears, resting for only an hour each day before taking up his knife to fight again. Fire bears favored stomping through lava, and losing that advantageous environment would leave them feeling constrained. After all, humans were smarter than bears. To pursue perfection, he strictly enforced his use of talismans but never discarded them. He often utilized talisman arrays to cut their morale, adapting to the rhythm of combat during the Condense Essence Stage.

On the fourth day, Li Hui finally began to use spirit talismans on a large scale, taking control of the battlefield and dominating it, piling up the corpses of the massive beasts.

Just in this single day, he killed over a hundred fire bears, and by the fifth day, he had basically wiped them out. If the Inferno were still boiling with lava, exterminating these fire bears would have demanded considerable effort, if not proving impossible. As of now, he had counted them all.

“Finally cleaned up!”

Li Hui, panting heavily, stood up to search around, feeling a bit dumbfounded: “How annoying? I thought there would be a Miao Jade vein in the bear den, but it turned out to be a pile of ancient golden crow feathers, using the Gathering Spirit Formation to conglomerate fire-type spiritual energy. It looks like the handiwork of Hongluan female cultivators.”

“Let it be golden crow feathers! It’s better than getting nothing at all.” He entered the Gathering Spirit Formation to collect the ancient golden crow feathers.

These feathers were fiery red and scorching hot, each one over five feet long and heavy in hand, like large fans made of fine iron.

After grabbing the items, he hurriedly left; without the items to maintain the Gathering Spirit Formation, it would soon collapse and fall apart.

Li Hui sped away, and just as he passed through the teleportation array and returned to the surface, he felt a fierce tremor beneath his feet. The disturbance was somewhat unexpected, so he quickly oriented himself and fled. This was what they called "doing good deeds without leaving a name," free from clearing out the Inferno while leaving below a bright and clear world.

“Boom, boom, boom…” The Haotu Sect trembled.

“What happened recently?” The elders and true disciples soared into the sky to invite experts skilled in Innate Techniques to calculate the changes in the geography. After two sticks of incense, they received results: “Let’s go check out the Fire Bearer’s Inferno.”

Hundreds of figures headed towards the Fire Bearer’s Inferno, discovering numerous collapses underground, with lava veins having shifted and the Inferno devoid of heat.

“How could this be?”

“Someone has slaughtered the fire bears and taken away the golden crow feathers.”

“It’s more than that; this person even drew away the Inferno’s fire energy. Could it be that a Bosa practitioner cultivating fire techniques broke through the underground to sneak over and cause chaos?”

Guess away! No one guessed correctly.

The Innate Techniques were indeed impressive, calculating that this person was from within the sect; however, there were so many personnel within the sect that they couldn’t pinpoint exactly who it was!

As for Li Hui? He had already headed towards another secret realm known as the Abyss of Darkness, where evil ghosts roamed, dangerous spirits lurked, and Master Yingjun compassionately came to enlighten them while casually collecting thousands of talisman flags to take back…