Chapter 53: Chapter 53: Reunion(1)
Great Tao Desert, a massive desert located between the Eastern Region and Southern Region.
It is under the control of Spirit Hall, with various desert cities serving as trading hub between the East and the South.
And the only thing separating these two regions was the Yellow Earth Mountain Range.
This mountain range was a jagged spine of scorched sienna and burnt orange, carved into bizarre, skeletal shapes by millennia of abrasive desert winds.
And at this mont, hidden within a narrow fissure that looked like nothing more than a trick of the shadow, Fairy Liu, still navigating through Huo Yue’s weary body, slipped inside a cave.
The interior of the cave was cool, the air slling of dry dust and ancient mineral, providing a stark contrast to the oppressive, shimring heat of the Great Tao Desert outside.
Just then, the ethereal blue glow faded from Huo Yue’s eyes as Fairy Liu retreated back into the ring, leaving the young woman to collapse against the smooth sandstone wall.
Huo Yue breathed heavily, her chest heaving as she wiped a streak of gri from her forehead, but she couldn’t help but grin as her heart was drumming a frantic, joyful rhythm against her ribs.
"That was... incredibly thrilling!" she managed to wheeze out, her voice echoing in the cavern.
"No! No, it’s not!" Ziyan snapped, her usual cool and aloof deanor completely shattered.
The cat-eared rcenary glared at Huo Yue with a mix of terror and disbelief before sliding down the opposite wall and closing her eyes, her feline ears twitching at every phantom sound from the tunnel.
"I really thought that I was about to die. I could practically feel those serpent tails coiling around my neck."
"But we didn’t! And look at what we got for the trouble," Huo Yue countered, her eyes sparkling with a mischievous light.
She then sat up straight, ignoring the ache in her muscles, and began to rummage through her spatial storage. "Anyway, let’s lay low here for a while. The Lamias might be fast, but even they can’t track us through the air after ma—...my little stunt."
With a flourish, she began to pull items out of her ring, and the cave floor was soon covered in a staggering display of wealth; glistening spirit stones, carved jade boxes, and bundles of fragrant, glowing herbs.
"Here," Huo Yue said, pushing a massive pile of the loot toward the stunned Ziyan. "Let’s each have half. You were a great help distracting those guards back there. It made it easier for
to steal these things."
Ziyan stared at the fortune before her, her throat bobbing as she swallowed hard.
"Thank you," she whispered, her voice regaining so of its composure as she nodded to Huo Yue, gathered her portion of the treasures, and walked deeper into the shadowy recesses of the cave to find a private spot to cultivate and nd her wounds.
Once Ziyan was out of sight, Huo Yue’s composure broke, and she began to smile like a thief who had just pulled off the heist of the millennium.
She hugged herself, rocking back and forth on her heels. "Fufufufu~! I’m rich! Rich! So filthy rich! Haoran won’t believe how much dowry I’ve gathered!"
Once she cald down a little, she began to take a frantic, joyous inventory, and the grin wouldn’t leave her face as the haul was nothing short of legendary.
There were a total of 3 million dium-grade spirit stones, a sum that could buy a small city in the outskirts.
Then there were the ten thousand Bone-Chilling Spring Pearls, rare artifacts harvested from the deepest subterranean aquifers; they were invaluable for a fire cultivator, as they increased heat resistance and stabilized the volatile nature of one’s internal flas.
The pile continued with mountains of Rank 4 and 5 pills, followed by countless Rank 4 and 5 spirit herbs, with the occasional shimring leaf of a Rank 6 herb that radiated a potent, dicinal aroma.
And this was only one of their treasury! There are dozens more she couldn’t open because she lacked the ti! She wondered just how rich the Lamias really were.
But the crown jewel of the heist was the Blue Lily Earth Fla!
Huo Yue opened her inner world, feeling the intense, sapphire heat pulsing within her Dantian.
This was her second Heavenly Fla, ranked 18th in the Heavenly Fla rankings.
According to her master, this fla can only born under the pressure of the earth, and receiving tempering after tens of thousands of years.
Once it fully blooms, this fla has the ability to cause volcanic eruptions, and summon magma from the ground.
Integrating it during their frantic heist had been a gamble, but it had paid off.
The fla had not only evolved her Imperial Fla Transformation Technique into the Grand Tier Spirit Grade, but the sheer influx of pure elental energy had forced her cultivation to skyrocket, pushing her directly into the 9th Stage of the Core Formation Realm.
And also...
Hisss~
A soft, rhythmic hissing sound vibrated against her skin, and from the sleeve of her tattered brown cloak, a small, elegant head erged.
It was a snake no longer than a forearm, covered in shimring scales that shifted through every color of the rainbow like a prism held to the sun.
"Oh, Xiao i, are you hungry already?" Huo Yue swooned, her voice turning high and motherly at the sight of the cute creature.
She opened her palms, and a lily-shaped blue fla appeared, hovering just above her skin.
Although the heat was intense, the snake seed like it didn’t mind at all, "Co, co, eat. You need your strength if you’re going to keep being my lucky charm."
The snake, whom Huo Yue had dubbed Xiao i, slithered onto her palms and began to "eat" the fla, drawing the essence of the Blue Lily into its tiny body.
"I can’t believe that terrifying Queen dusa was this cute," Huo Yue mused, poking the snake gently on its head and began petting it as it ate.
It was the ultimate irony, actually. This tiny, docile creature was indeed the terrifying Queen dusa, the undisputed sovereign of all Lamias and a genuine 9th Stage Spirit Ascension Realm powerhouse.
The reason she had been reduced to this vulnerable state was a tale of ambition and tragedy.
She had been attempting to purify her ancient bloodline using the Blue Lily Earth Fla she found and the fla that Huo Yue stole, to breakthrough into the Nirvana Rebirth Realm.
She had succeeded in the evolution, but the process had been too violent and the backlash had thoroughly damaged her soul, forcing her into a deep slumber and regressing her body into this infantile, primal form.
It was actually because of that incident that Huo Yue had the chance to steal the fla, if not, she can only dream of stealing sothing that a Spirit Ascension Realm Expert possessed.
"Don’t be fooled by her appearance," Fairy Liu’s voice suddenly rang in Huo Yue’s ears, sharp and warning. "Although she looks small and harmless now, that snake is the infant form of a Rainbow-Scaled Divine Serpent, a genuine Rank 10 Demonic Beast."
"What!? Rank 10!?" Huo Yue’s jaw dropped.
In the hierarchy of the Pri Origin Realm, a Rank 1 Demonic Beast is equivalent to a Qi Gathering Realm, while Rank 10 is equivalent to a Heavenly Saint.
As for the equivalent of Body Refining Realm, well, beasts of that level doesn’t have Beastial Qi, so they couldn’t technically qualify as a Demonic Beasts, so so people rely referred to them as "Fierce Beasts
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