I made the entire cultivation world cry

Chapter 270 Entrance to Kundao Palace (Seeking monthly votes)
Burning Heart Ancestor stared at the direction Zhao Cangyun and the others had fled, his eyes blazing with fury.

"A swarm of ants!"

Hongli dragged her injured body and limped over to Fenxin's side, squeezing out a weak whimper. Her tail wagged cautiously, and her emerald eyes were wet and full of flattery.

It mimicked the way it used to act coquettishly towards Jiang Yi, gently nuzzling Fen Xin with its head and whimpering softly.

Burning Heart glanced down at it and suddenly smiled.

Hongli's eyes brightened slightly, her tail wagged even more enthusiastically, and she endured the pain by raising her front paws, trying to look as cute as she could be.

However, the next moment, Burning Heart's smile suddenly turned ferocious, and the Burning Heaven Fire Wheel roared down!
Blood splatters!

One of Hongli's tails snapped off, and scalding fox blood splattered onto the yellow sand.

Hongli convulsed in pain, its shrill screams tearing through the air. It curled up into a ball, its remaining two tails tucked tightly under its belly, its fur standing on end, its eyes filled with disbelief and terror.

Burning Heart stepped on its severed tail wound, grinding it, and the gray flames seeped into its meridians through the wound, burning its demonic seed.

Hongli convulsed violently in pain, but dared not even struggle, only able to let out broken sobs.

"What I want are ferocious beasts that kill, not groveling dogs!"

Burning Heart bent down, pinching Red Glass's chin with her fingertips, forcing it to raise its head.

"If I ever see you like this again..."

With her other hand, she gently stroked the remaining two tails of Hongli, gray flames dancing on her fingertips.

"You don't need these two either."

quack!
The fire-swallowing toad chirped in agreement from the side.

Hongli's pupils constricted, and her whole body trembled even more violently. Fenxin grinned and took out the storage pendant that Hongli had been hanging around her neck. She took out the healing pills that Hongli had refined herself and fed them to Hongli. She patted its head and stood up.

Immediately afterwards, Fenxin took out a large number of inertia-transformed demon seeds from Hongli's storage pendant and threw them to the Fire-Swallowing Golden Toad next to him. The Fire-Swallowing Golden Toad curled its long tongue and swallowed the demon seeds.

Fenxin stroked the storage pendant in her hand, and then thought of Jiang Yi. The demonic species in this storage pendant was very special. She had previously been determined to kill Jiang Yi, but now, because of these demonic species, she had changed her mind.

She wanted to capture that crazy girl alive, and once she reached the Core Formation stage and was able to use the Soul Searching Technique, she would see exactly how many interesting secrets this crazy girl was hiding.

She had never seen a demon species that could be swallowed whole before.

They also arrested the kid who had just used two swords; the fire on his body seemed to be no less intense than the Xuanwu Heart Fire.

This trip yielded quite a few unexpected gains.

"Rise, use your shapeshifting magic, and lead me into the city."

Burning Heart gave the order in a low voice, and Red Glass did not dare to hesitate at all. Its severed tail was a bloody mess, but it could only endure the pain and get up. It used its illusion technique to take Burning Heart and the girl and transform into ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivators and demon spirits to enter the city.

Hongli gritted her teeth, not daring to utter a single sob, as Jiang Yi's face involuntarily surfaced in her mind.

That always lazy fellow would never torment it. Even if it was lazy, caused trouble, or even yelled at her, she would just pretend to be fierce and call it a "rebellious daughter." At most, she would just ignore it.

It used to think that with its talent and ability, it would be pampered and spoiled no matter which demon tamer it followed, and would get whatever it wanted.

But now it understands that not everyone is like Jiang Yi, who sees through its willfulness and cunning yet still indulges it, gives it elixirs for alchemy, helps it cultivate magic, and guides it in combat.

Even when forced to break the contract, it would rather injure its own consciousness than inflict the damage of forcibly severing the contract on it.

Scalding tears fell silently onto the sand. This time, no one would hold it in their arms and gently ask, "Does it hurt?"

After a moment of grief, Hongli felt the pain in its tail, rallied, and carefully recalled everything Jiang Yi had taught it, as well as what it had overheard when Jiang Yi taught Huagu, quickly digesting and understanding it.

Because of the Yin-Yang Pendant, Burning Heart was temporarily unable to form a contract with it and had not discovered the problem, so he crafted a shackle to lock around its neck.

Therefore, it still has a chance.

……

The ruins are located a hundred miles outside the ancient city.

A fierce wind swept past, carrying sand and gravel. Shen Puning lay on Baozhu's back, with three deep claw marks on her back that revealed the bone, and blood soaking half of her clothes.

Her face was deathly pale, and fine beads of cold sweat appeared on her forehead, but she gritted her teeth and refused to faint.

"Puning, hold on!" Xin Wushuang took out a pill and fed it to Shen Puning. He then discovered that black energy was faintly emanating from the edges of the wound, eroding into the flesh like a living thing.

"This is demonic energy! The person impersonating Senior Sister is a demon!" Liu Taozhi's pupils shrank, and she immediately pressed her fingers together against Shen Puning's back.

The icy sword energy flowed into her meridians like a trickle, freezing the spreading demonic energy. This was a skill she had honed on the battlefield of the North Sea coast, capable of delaying the onset of demonic energy and buying time for the injured to return for treatment.

Shen Puning groaned. Her barbarian physique allowed her to withstand the attack, but the erosion of demonic energy made her body burn, and strange dark patterns appeared faintly under her skin.

She struggled to lift her head, her voice hoarse, "I'm alright... First, try to notify... those outside..."

Zhao Cangyun squatted to the side, his eyes blazing with fury. "That damned old hag!"

Xin Wushuang frowned. "This demonic energy is strange and difficult to remove by ordinary means... Perhaps only Ayi can cure it."

"Senior Sister?" Zhao Cangyun's eyes lit up. "Yes! Senior Sister must have a way! She'll definitely go and settle accounts with that old hag!"

Liu Taozhi pondered for a moment, the icy sword energy still circulating within Shen Puning's body, barely suppressing the spread of demonic energy. "In that case, why don't we risk following Ancestor Burning Heart and wait for an opportunity to reunite with Senior Sister?"

“But we don’t know where Ancestor Tianxin has gone.” Xin Wushuang said with worry.

Upon hearing this, Zhao Cangyun chuckled, "Don't worry, when I ambushed that old hag just now, I poured the whole bottle of bug droppings that Shang Shixu gave me over her head! Senior Sister said that's called 'poop poured over the head,' which means that the old hag is about to die!"

After quickly finishing their discussion, Liu Tao used a secret technique of the Immortal Alliance to send a message to her Golden Core Uncle of the Xuan Ying Sword Sect in the secret realm, explaining the matter and asking him to send Luo Qingsi to support them.

With Baozhu carrying Shen Puning, Xin Wushuang holding a bow on guard, and Zhao Cangyun leading the way like a hunting dog, they sped towards the ancient city ruins, following the scent that only he could detect.

……

At the same time, the Burning Heart Ancestor led the girl through the dark passageway to the underground ruins of the ancient city.

Yellow sand poured down from the hole overhead like a waterfall. The deep pit underground was supported by twelve stone pillars engraved with runes. The pillars were already weathered and eroded, but they still stubbornly held up the dome that was about to collapse.

The surrounding vegetation is lush, with golden fireflies flitting among it, like an underground oasis.

To the side stood a small palace. From where the two were, the female stone statue inside lay overturned on the ground. The face of the statue was blurred, and the gems that were inlaid on its body had long been pried off, leaving only dark grooves. Some people had speculated that it was the Kun Emperor Fangyi.

"Is Kundao Palace located right below here?"

The girl kicked away the broken pottery jar at her feet, and her eyes behind the iron mask looked into the bottomless pit in the center of the ground.

“I remember there was only an abandoned altar down there.”

Burning Heart chuckled and leaped into the deep pit, followed closely by the shrunken Red Glass carrying the equally shrunken Fire-Swallowing Toad.

The altar at the bottom of the pit had long since collapsed into ruins, and the cracks in the octagonal stone slabs were filled with sand. The strange engravings that had been repeatedly trampled on flickered in the firelight.

These markings are neither runes nor ancient characters; they are symmetrical and regular, yet they are incomprehensible.

Dozens of stone warrior figures lay scattered about, some clutching severed weapons, others with their heads rolled on the ground, and all the mechanical parts that could be removed were left with only ugly broken pieces.

"The best way to hide something is to hide it right under everyone's nose."

Burning her heart, she crushed a piece of pottery with fish and bird patterns and took out a palm-sized pagoda stone carving, which was a roof decoration she had picked up casually from the ruins of the ancient city.

Burning Heart lifted the stone pagoda sculpture, its base facing the ghostly girl who appeared in the distance.

The girl squinted and examined it for a moment. Only after Fenxin's deliberate reminder did she realize that the uneven patterns at the bottom of the pagoda stone carving were exactly the same as the octagonal outline in the center of the altar, as well as the strange symmetrical patterns in the outline.

They are not entirely identical, but the patterns are the same.

Could it be that... the altar stone slab is the base of a pagoda, upside down?

The girl frowned and said, "Over the years, all of us who were able to sneak in have explored this place. We even sent the earth-burrowing demon spirits down to at least a hundred feet below. Apart from some ores, we haven't found anything else."

Burning Heart casually tossed aside the pagoda sculpture, crossed his arms, and stood to the side. "Then it depends on whether your key matches this lock!"

The girl stood at the edge of the altar, staring at Fenxin with a half-smile for a moment, scrutinizing him and wondering if he was trying to trick her.

Finally, the girl smiled, walked to the center of the altar, and took out a piece of broken black tortoise shell, which she had only recently acquired.

Fenxin narrowed her eyes, her gaze shifting between the girl and the tortoise shell. The tortoise shell seemed ordinary, but it faintly exuded an aura that made her uncomfortable.

The girl held the tortoise shell in her palm and chanted an ancient and obscure incantation. The syllables were strange, like a chant or a sigh, making people dizzy.

As the incantation deepened, wisps of black demonic energy seeped from the cracks along the edge of the tortoise shell, coiling and moving like living things.

The ground began to tremble, and fine sand and gravel tumbled down. The stone slabs at the bottom of the pit groaned under the weight, as if some enormous creature below was being awakened, resonating with the power within the tortoise shell.

A hint of joy flashed in the girl's eyes.

The moment the tortoise shell landed in the center of the altar, it dissolved like ink into water, and black demonic energy surged into a vortex that was unfathomable.

"Ancestor," the girl turned her head, her eyes curving into a smile beneath the iron mask, "aren't you afraid of demonic energy corrupting your physical body now?"

Before she could finish speaking, the girl took a step and leaped into the vortex, instantly swallowed by darkness.

Burning Heart stared intently at the vortex of demonic energy, the gray flames flickering uneasily at his fingertips.

She loathed demonic energy, something she had once sworn to eradicate.

"Mere demonic energy!"

Fenxin grabbed Hongli by the back of the neck with one hand and grabbed the Fire-Swallowing Toad with the other, his body covered in gray-white flames like armor.

The moment Fenxin leaped into the vortex, the gray fire and demonic energy collided violently, emitting a piercing shriek, as if they were irreconcilable enemies.

Soon, darkness engulfed everything.

When the demonic energy vortex disappeared, in the palace above.

boom!
The wall was punched through from the inside, and the girl in green, along with the white-clad swordsman, two stone lion warriors, and a cloud, filed out of the hole.

　Today's two chapters totaled over 6400 words, so I won't be adding any extra chapters. There are always a lot of things to do during holidays.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)