Mortal: Fifteenth Realm Sword Cultivator

Chapter 234 Denial Triple

A pale purple streak of light fell from the sky, narrowly missing the edges of several low mountain peaks, before crashing heavily into a vast river below.

Ordinary waterways may be called streams, rivers, or rivers, but only those that stretch for thousands of miles and have a magnificent flow are qualified to be called "Great Rivers".

The water burst open with a roar, like a white lotus in full bloom, only to be swallowed up by the rushing water.

A moment later, a figure emerged from the water; it was Yuan Yao.

She held the unconscious Zi Ling tightly in her arms, the two of them drenched and suspended above the river.

Zi Ling's face was ashen, her breath weak, but her hand still gripped the dimly lit wooden dragon tablet tightly.

Yuan Yao forcefully gathered her true essence, concealing her aura to the point of near-absence, and flew downstream with the current.

Zi Ling activated the wooden dragon tablet with all her might, but only managed to sustain it for three breaths before exhausting all the spiritual power within her body.

It was in those three breaths that the two of them instantly left the range of the Nascent Soul cultivator's divine sense and fled more than three hundred miles away.

However, Yuan Yao dared not take any chances and pushed her escape technique to its limit, transforming into a stream of ink-wash light.

not enough!

While going downstream might delay discovery, it's not a long-term solution.

We must find a perfect hiding place as soon as possible.

Ideally, it should be a place with a diverse atmosphere, dense population, and where immortals and mortals coexist.

Only in such places would these two "fish that slipped through the net" have a 20-30% chance of being completely safe.

Things turned out exactly as Yuan Yao had predicted.

About the time it takes to drink a cup of tea later, a large, thick cloud of blood rolled in from the sky and hovered precisely above the point where the light from the wooden dragon stele had disappeared.

The blood-red clouds surged and subsided, revealing Wang Tiangu, a cultivator in the early Nascent Soul stage.

His expression was stern; he had received an urgent message from the Soul Shatterer.

The Soul Shattering Immortal was overwhelmed with other matters and felt it wasn't worth the trouble to go to such lengths for two junior Core Formation cultivators, so he simply entrusted the task of tracking them to Wang Tiangu, who was also nearby.

The speed of a Nascent Soul cultivator is ultimately unmatched by a Core Formation disciple.

Wang Tiangu frowned, his divine sense sweeping across the surroundings like a tidal wave, trying to capture that barely perceptible residual aura.

However, under the cover of the dense moisture, the traces were almost non-existent.

He snorted coldly, made a hand seal, and a bronze compass phantom engraved with intricate Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches symbols appeared in his palm.

The compass needle vibrated violently, pointing southwest and swaying within a range of about five degrees.

"The River of Fallen Arrows —"

Wang Tiangu's gaze followed the direction of the pointer, and his expression darkened further.

This great river, stretching for thousands of miles, traversing the Taiyue Mountains and reaching the northern Liangshan Mountains of the Nine Kingdoms Alliance, is said to have originated from a rudimentary form created by a powerful being in ancient times with a single sword strike. Over the years, it has eroded and evolved into its current majestic form.

It was this abundant water vapor that greatly interfered with the compass's readings.

He flipped his hand and put away the compass, cursing inwardly as a nuisance.

To use a stealth technique that consumes vital essence?

They covered seventy or eighty miles in an instant, but at the cost of severely weakening their strength.

Using this technique to hunt down two Nascent Soul juniors was really not worth the risk, and Wang Tiangu was quite hesitant.

After a moment's hesitation, a fierce glint flashed in his eyes.

His figure transformed once again into a viscous cloud of blood, clinging to the surging surface of the Yiluo River, and sped downstream.

His divine sense was like a vast net, covering the waters and banks within a hundred-mile radius, not missing a single suspicious fluctuation of spiritual energy.

With his escape techniques, as long as the direction is right, a sweep of his divine sense will definitely reveal some clues; it will just take a little more time.

It plunged straight down the river at an extremely high speed.

Not long after, Zi Ling slowly woke up and struggled slightly in Yuan Yao's arms. "Don't move. Rest for a while and recover your energy. I can hold on for now. It's okay if I can hold on for a while. I'm just afraid that someone will come after us."

Zi Ling opened her slightly tired eyes, took out a spirit stone from her storage bag, held it in her palm, and silently absorbed spiritual energy to restore the almost depleted spiritual power in her body.

"We can't keep running away like this. Lu Jianghe said that we should always be prepared for the worst. If we keep hoping for the best, things could turn out completely different."

Yuan Yao neither confirmed nor denied this.

Fortunately, she had transformed from an ordinary cultivator into a sword cultivator, and with the exquisite sword escape technique taught by her master Zhuang Huayi, her speed was in no way inferior to that of a late-stage Core Formation cultivator.

At this moment, she only used 80% of her spiritual power to suppress the ripples of energy to a state that could just offset the vast water vapor of the great river below, thus ensuring speed while minimizing the spiritual energy fluctuations caused by the escape light.

If we go all out, leaving too many traces will only make it easier to expose our whereabouts, which would be counterproductive.

Yuan Yao said, "I will activate the wooden dragon tablet later. We will continue to head southwest along this river. In short, we must not underestimate the abilities of Nascent Soul cultivators and must be prepared to be caught up at any time."

The worst-case scenario was already prepared for in the calm words.

Zi Ling looked up at that profile, which was slightly tense due to nervousness but still couldn't hide its charm, and suddenly chuckled softly.

Only by preparing for the worst can we have the right to expect the best outcome.

Yuan Yao shook her head in annoyance, "I must have been bewitched. Instead of cultivating properly in the best cave in Tianxing City, I insisted on coming here with you to risk my life."

Since no one was around, Zi Ling didn't need to hide anything and said directly, "Because you have him in your heart. Otherwise, even if I talked until the end, would you agree? In the end, it was you who agreed, I didn't hold a knife to your throat."

Yuan Yao blushed slightly and glared at Zi Ling with feigned anger: "It's enough to know in your heart, why say it out loud? It's so embarrassing."

Zi Ling's lips curled up, then she suddenly thought of something and turned to look at Yuan Yao, her eyes searching: "When Elder Shi said he didn't mention Sister Guiqi, did he have even the slightest hesitation in his heart?"

Yuan Yao's expression was calm, but a firmness shone deep within her foxy eyes.

"There's nothing to hesitate about, hehe, and I don't even dare to think about it. I'm just going down this path to the bitter end, leaving myself no room for regret."

Hearing these self-deprecating words, Zi Ling understood the desperate resolve behind them.

It wasn't because of deep feelings.

A Core Formation cultivator, abandoning the perfectly good path.

How could they risk such danger to venture into this completely unknown world, just to find one person?

How can something be unforgettable without enough regrets?

The person who said that is lying to ghosts.

"Would you regret it if you got caught?"

"Sister, I have a feeling that if we wait for him to come back on his own initiative, I don't think we can even think about it for hundreds of years."

Reason tells me that the best outcome is to strive to cultivate and break through to a higher realm, which would make it possible to continue on the same path, but I can't do that.

He's so mean! He knows exactly how we feel, but he just ignores it and pretends to be oblivious. Now that we've come after him, he can't just refuse, can he? If he continues like this, then I... then I'll just—stop talking to him.

She murmured to herself, her eyes glistening with tears, and gently wiped away the moisture from her eyes with her fingers.

Yuan Yao rarely swore, "This is utter bullshit, like a mute eating bitter melon. No one can stop you, and you can't refuse to eat it."

""

Zi Ling was amused by these words, "It's okay, it's okay. Since we're here, there's always a 10% chance."

Linglong Mountain in the Northern Liang Kingdom.

"Still not telling your senior the truth?"

The speaker was a woman, sitting in a chair, fiddling with a scroll of bamboo slips in front of her, and sketching with a brush.

She was wearing a dark purple robe with a high neckline, and a glimpse of snow-white skin could still be seen when she bent over.

Her hair was tied up in a high bun, adorned only with two simple wooden hairpins. Her face was aloof, and her willow-leaf eyebrows and almond-shaped eyes exuded an air of quiet authority.

On the other side, Nangong Wan looked like a little girl, with her hands behind her back, her fingertips hooked together, and her toes unconsciously tapping the ground.

Upon hearing her senior sister Nangong Que's question, she pursed her lips and remained silent for a long time.

Nangong Que continued to work on his documents with his head down. He rolled up the bamboo slips he had reviewed and put them aside, then picked up a new one and began to unroll it. His voice turned colder.

"Don't play the victim in front of me. This is no small matter. If you don't tell the truth, once Wei Wuyai investigates it personally, I won't even have a chance to defend you."

Nangong Wan's expression became even more conflicted.

Seeing this, Nangong Que finally sighed softly and put down his pen.

"Junior sister, we have been living in Beiliang, one of the Nine Kingdoms Alliance, since we migrated from Yue Kingdom. This place is poor in resources. Although we are all in the same alliance, there is a clear distinction between inside and outside. We, the sects from outside, have shallow foundations and are in a difficult situation. We are walking on thin ice, and every step we take is fraught with danger. If we are not careful, or if we disagree, it could lead to a great disaster."

"Now, the eyes of the three great cultivators of Tiannan are focused on this matter. Although Wei Wuyai hasn't said it explicitly, your act of trespassing into the heart of the Ghost Spirit Sect can't be kept secret forever. If he wants to give the Hehuan Old Demon an explanation, what do you think Senior Sister should do?"

Nangong Wan muttered to herself, "At worst, we can just hand me over."

Upon hearing this, Nangong Que's expression froze for a moment, then he laughed in exasperation.

She stood up, walked up to Nangong Wan, extended a jade-like finger, and with a hint of disappointment, gently tapped her junior sister's smooth forehead.

"You!"

Nangong Que's voice was tinged with helplessness, "You are no longer the Core Formation cultivator you once were, but a dignified Nascent Soul Ancestor! Don't speak and act so childishly anymore. I've neglected to discipline you in the past, letting you have your way. But now, at such a critical juncture, with the eyes of three great cultivators watching, you still say such angry words? Do you think the trouble isn't big enough, or do you think your senior sister can definitely protect you?"

Nangong Wan leaned back slightly, poked, "What can I do? I really don't know that guy surnamed Lu well! We've only met a few times, and we've barely exchanged a few words. Who knew he would cause such a commotion, and yet—yet—"

Nangong Que narrowed his eyes slightly. "You two actually know each other?"

When Nangong Wan heard this, she was so angry that she almost died. How could anyone say such a thing?

She immediately shook her head in denial, her eyes darting around, her voice sounding somewhat flustered.

"Uh—really? I didn't say that, did I? Senior sister, you must have misheard."