Jiang Mo had absolutely no interest in the broken magical artifact in the female cultivator's hand. She had only appeared to ask if they had encountered any other people these past days. However, she was disappointed to learn that in the ten-plus days since entering the secret realm, today was the first ti they had t anyone else.
The male cultivator, hoping to earn her goodwill, voluntarily explained: "Before entering the secret realm, my sect brothers and I left magical treasures for communication, but after entering, even usually reliable magical treasures beca ineffective, making it impossible to contact anyone. So I had no choice but to pick a random direction to walk, and only today did I encounter soone..." As for killing people to seize treasures, since no one asked, he naturally wouldn't volunteer such information.
Rules within secret realms often differed from the outside world, so losing contact after entering was not uncommon. Sects had their thods to deal with this, such as the jade pendants of the Xuanqing Sect, the Eight Trigrams Mirror of the Tiandao Sect, and the prayer beads of the Buddha Sect—all magical treasures capable of contacting fellow sect mbers in various environnts.
Jiang Mo ignored the male cultivator and turned to the female cultivator, asking: "In all that you've seen along your way, have you noticed anything unusual?"
The female cultivator was very sensible. Without hesitation, she shook her head and said: "No. This secret realm is quite strange, as if there's nothing here. Spiritual plants, spirit beasts, heavenly materials and earthly treasures—I haven't encountered any of them. The soil here seems all black, and the sky has been gloomy, never clearing up. In all these days, this magical artifact is my only find." Though the person before her clearly had no interest in it.
Jiang Mo neither confird nor denied the female cultivator's words, because she herself had not co away empty-handed; in fact, she had "picked up scraps" quite abundantly along the way. However, given this female cultivator's cultivation level and experience, she most likely couldn't recognize those minerals, so for her, it truly would seem like finding nothing.
As for the weather and environnt, this secret realm truly remained unchanged, with no way to distinguish ti apart from day and night.
Finally, Jiang Mo thought for a mont and asked them without much hope: "Do you know how long this secret realm will remain open, or how to leave?"
The two looked at each other, then simultaneously shook their heads helplessly. Apparently afraid of disappointing or angering her, the female cultivator cautiously speculated: "This secret realm can't possibly have nothing. Perhaps we need to wait for soone to discover its secrets and trigger a chanism before we can leave. Or maybe this is a place of inheritance, and once soone obtains the legacy left by the secret realm, we can all leave?"
People who entered secret realms rarely considered the issue of leaving. Even if this secret realm appeared to have nothing, the two obviously hadn't thought about departure. The reason was simple—this secret realm was rich in spiritual energy, comparable to so immortal mountains and blessed lands, making it worthwhile to stay for cultivation.
But Jiang Mo wasn't so relaxed. Having heard these speculations that were barely better than nothing, she knew she couldn't get much more from them. She casually took out a high-grade spirit stone to feed the Little Swan Goose, then said to her: "Senior Sister, I've finished asking. You can release them now."
The Little Swan Goose swallowed the spirit stone in one gulp. With a slight flicker of her Phoenix eyes, the ice encasing the female cultivator instantly lted away.
Yun Qingyue's cultivation was far superior to those two, and when the Swan Goose took action, it was extraordinary. The ice that had frozen them was akin to profound ice. Even for cultivators, being frozen by this ice for a mont would cause stiffness in limbs and blockage in ridians.
As soon as the ice on the female cultivator lted, she lost her support and collapsed to the ground, unable to stand steadily. Even after recovering for a while, she couldn't stop shivering. It was evident she had been severely frozen, but at least she was freed from her predicant. She didn't dare linger or entangle herself, hastily offering thanks before unsteadily flying away on her sword, taking her broken magical artifact with her.
With the female cultivator gone, the remaining male cultivator grew anxious, or rather, fearful. He forced a smile that looked worse than crying: "Respected Senior, if you have more questions, this junior will certainly tell everything I know."
Jiang Mo had no favorable impression of this male cultivator who intended to kill for treasure, but the secret realm was sowhat bizarre, and since he hadn't offended her directly, she didn't harbor any killing intent at the mont. However, since the Little Swan Goose wasn't releasing him, she didn't insist otherwise. She gently stroked the Little Swan Goose's smooth feathers, gradually convincing herself that the feel of Phoenix feathers was also quite nice.
Seeing her silence, the male cultivator thought he couldn't escape his fate. He couldn't discern the cultivation level of the person before him, and considering that the bird in her arms had immobilized them both with just a flap of its wings, it was obvious their cultivation far exceeded his own.
So the male cultivator didn't dare act rashly and began pleading repeatedly, making himself sound as pitiful as possible.
Likely annoyed by his clamor, the Little Swan Goose glared with her Phoenix eyes, and the male cultivator's mouth was sealed with ice. However, she didn't trouble him further and casually released the ice binding his body. Seeing this, the male cultivator was overjoyed; ignoring the ice on his mouth, he stumbled away even faster than the female cultivator had.
However, having been frozen longer and with the female cultivator already ahead, it was impossible for him to catch up and seize her treasure.
Watching the male cultivator's retreating figure, Jiang Mo sighed silently. She patted the Little Swan Goose's head and said to her: "Let's go. We'll be able to leave eventually. For now, let's continue picking up scr... I an, let's continue mining."
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Jiang Mo and the Little Swan Goose's days in the secret realm were both painful and joyful. Though they were constantly on edge, the minerals in this secret realm were truly abundant. Aside from worrying that after a long ti, the Little Swan Goose's "food reserves" might not be enough, they were essentially wholeheartedly picking up money.
But thousands of miles away from them, soone else was not faring so well.
Qingyu had been awake for three days. When she woke, she found herself on a cliff, and to her delight, there was light. Even though the sky remained gloomy, without a trace of sunlight, having light to see her surroundings proved they had escaped the spatial layer of the underground... After a year, they finally saw daylight again!
As delighted as Qingyu was upon waking, she beca equally alard after regaining clarity and seeing her current predicant—she had been injured by demonic elents underground and had been unconscious for a long ti. Now she finally understood why she was here.
She had been carried up by Zhu Baiyi, and the usually proud White Fox was now in a terrible state, lying motionless on the ground as if dead.
Seeing this, Qingyu's heart sank. Disregarding the rope tied around her waist and even forgetting she was a cultivator, she anxiously reached out to check if the White Fox was still breathing. After a few breaths, feeling the faint airflow at her fingertips, she finally relaxed, her back already soaked with cold sweat.
After calming down, Qingyu suddenly realized she was still lying on Zhu Baiyi's back, pressing down on her, so she hurriedly untied the rope to get up. But as she moved, she discovered her body was stiff; her upper body could still move, but her lower body was completely numb... In the end, she rolled off the White Fox's back, falling to the ground with great difficulty even to crawl, and unable to summon even a trace of spiritual energy.
As a cultivator, and a high-level one who had cultivated for hundreds of years, Qingyu had never felt so helpless and weak. Even when previously gravely injured, as long as she could mobilize her spiritual energy, she would never reach such a desperate situation.
But now it was different—her body couldn't move, her spiritual energy couldn't be summoned, and the only one she could rely on, Zhu Baiyi, lay unconscious beside her.
For the first ti, Qingyu felt imnse panic. She tried to absorb spiritual energy to recover but failed, then attempted to open her storage space to use spiritual dicines but also failed. Finally, looking around and finding not even a blade of grass in the barren surroundings, she had no materials to work with.
With no choice, Qingyu couldn't save herself, let alone help the clearly injured Zhu Baiyi. She could only crawl to the enormous White Fox's side and push her forcefully, trying to wake her: "Zhu Baiyi, Zhu Baiyi... Ah Yi, Little Bai, wake up!"
Qingyu pushed hard for quite a while, but for the massive White Fox, her strength wasn't enough to move her at all. Qingyu called for a long ti without waking her, and her heart grew increasingly worried and fearful. After carefully examining the fox, she discovered not only serious injuries but also complete spiritual energy depletion, which had caused her to fall into a deep slumber.
When cultivators faint, they instinctively absorb spiritual energy to recover, and as long as there are no fatal wounds that can't be delayed, there's no need to worry. There was spiritual energy here, but the only concern was how long this natural recovery would take.
Qingyu didn't know that she and Zhu Baiyi had already been unconscious at the cliff's edge for several days. Now she felt only regret and helplessness—they had stayed in the underground world too long, where it was full of demonic elents, unsuitable for human cultivators to remain long. To find the Third Elder and eliminate future troubles, they had nearly depleted all the dicinal pills and spirit stones in their storage spaces, and finally, having achieved their goal, they failed to obtain a teleportation scroll.
She had been injured in battle with the Third Elder and didn't know how Zhu Baiyi had managed to bring her out from underground. But now, setting aside her injuries, even if she could open her storage space, there was hardly anything useful left inside.
At this mont, she couldn't help Zhu Baiyi, nor could she save herself; all that remained was to leave it to fate.
Looking up at the gloomy sky, she no longer felt the joy of when she first opened her eyes. Qingyu propped herself up, biting her lip as she laboriously moved closer to Zhu Baiyi. She leaned slightly, pressing her face against the fox's head.
The mountain wind blew her clothes, and without spiritual energy to protect her body, she rarely felt such coldness, with only warmth remaining in her embrace. So she lowered her head slightly, holding the fox tighter...
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