I'm in Yellow Maple Valley, and I have one equipment slot!

"I think you've misunderstood."

Zhou Yuan shook his head, his smile fading, and his tone returned to its usual calm.

"I've summoned you not to fight for power here. I simply want to ask you whether you still have any of your cultivation items with you when you were dragged into this place, such as cultivation manuals, jade slips, elixirs, talismans, magical artifact materials, or... any special tokens of inheritance?"

"what?"

The long-bearded old man and the others were all taken aback and looked at each other in bewilderment.

The red-faced old man hesitated and said, "Fellow Daoist Zhou, those things... cannot be used with spiritual power or divine sense here, they're no different from junk, mostly piled up in the corners of our dwellings gathering dust. Why, are you still interested in those things?"

"I am indeed interested."

Zhou Yuan said, "I need some of these. If you have them, you can give them to me!"

"I will take this with me when I leave this dark place!"

"Leave the Underworld?"

Upon hearing this, the group was initially taken aback, but then revealed expressions of bitterness, disbelief, and even mockery.

The long-bearded old man sighed, "Fellow Daoist Zhou, it's not surprising that you have such thoughts since you're new here. Weren't we all like that back then? But this Netherworld is a dead end where there's no way out! It's said that there's a 'Storm Mountain' in the northeast, and it's said that if you climb to the top, you might find a rift to escape this world."

"But let's not even talk about how fierce the winds on that mountain are, capable of freezing metal and stone. Just the few most terrifying Yin beasts that dwell at the foot and halfway up the mountain are invincible! Back then, some of us didn't believe in these superstitions and went to try it out together. As a result... we were almost frozen to death by the winds in less than half an hour. Some of our companions were even torn to shreds by the Yin beasts that suddenly appeared! Since then, no one has dared to mention leaving."

"Fellow Daoist Zhou, take my advice: since you're here, make the best of it. Spending the rest of your life peacefully here is better than going to Storm Mountain to your death!"

"Indeed, Fellow Daoist Zhou's martial arts are high, but they are only enough to deal with ordinary Yin beasts. The Yin beasts of Storm Mountain are far beyond human capability!"

Another person echoed this sentiment, clearly believing that Zhou Yuan was young and impetuous, unaware of his own limitations.

"Just because you can't leave doesn't mean I can't."

Zhou Yuan's tone remained calm, yet it exuded an undeniable and powerful confidence:

"Since I entered this place of my own volition, I am confident that I can leave as well. Now, I only ask, do you have what I need?"

Seeing his confidence, the others secretly sighed, thinking that this young man was blindly confident and would probably soon perish in Storm Mountain.

The long-bearded old man and the red-faced old man exchanged a glance and both shook their heads, clearly not believing that Zhou Yuan could succeed.

After a moment of silence, a hint of hesitation and struggle flashed across the red-faced old man's face. Finally, he gritted his teeth, stepped forward, and said in a low voice, "Fellow Daoist Zhou, I... before I was dragged into this place, I was the sect leader of the Great Jin Heavenly Talisman Sect."

A glint flashed in Zhou Yuan's eyes as he looked at him.

The red-faced old man continued, "My Heavenly Talisman Sect is renowned for its talisman-making techniques, and we possess three great inherited spiritual talismans. Due to the sudden turn of events, I only had time to carry the complete inheritance of the 'Spirit-Subduing Talisman' with me. The method for crafting this talisman is extremely precious, a closely guarded secret of our sect. Fellow Daoist Zhou…"

He raised his head, his eyes filled with a pleading yet resolute look. "If you, fellow Daoist, can truly leave this realm and return to the mortal world, I implore you to find a way to return this inheritance to my Great Jin Heavenly Talisman Sect! I... beg you..."

As he spoke, he actually bowed to Zhou Yuan.

Zhou Yuan raised his hand to stop him from bowing, but he was secretly delighted.

A spirit summoning talisman! It was indeed here!

"Yes. If I leave, I will find a way to send the inheritance to the Heavenly Talisman Sect."

He made a promise.

The red-faced old man, or rather, the former sect leader of the Fu Sect, was overjoyed upon hearing this, as if he had fulfilled his greatest wish in life, and was very excited.

"Thank you, fellow Daoist! Thank you, fellow Daoist! I will go and fetch it right away!"

Having said that, he turned and walked away quickly.

Before long, he returned carrying a wooden box that was about a foot long and a palm wide, with an old-fashioned color.

Opening it in front of Zhou Yuan, inside were several polished grayish-white bone fragments, with densely packed ancient seal characters and some complex rune patterns engraved on them with extremely fine engravings.

Although Zhou Yuan's divine sense was imprisoned, his eyesight was exceptional. With just a quick glance, he knew it was undoubtedly genuine.

He nodded, closed the wooden box, and handed it to Mei Ning, who was standing nearby, to hold.

Seeing that Zhou Yuanzhen had accepted the inheritance and promised to give it away, the other cultivators had different expressions.

Some people looked envious, some were indifferent, and some started to have interesting thoughts.

Finally, two more people hesitantly took out their treasured storage bags, which were useless here, containing their old cultivation techniques, some materials or special items, and handed them to Zhou Yuan, just to make a good connection.

If Zhou Yuan were to give up halfway through his climb and return to the village, perhaps they would have hope.

Zhou Yuan asked Mei Ning to help him organize and pack these storage bags.

Having achieved his goal, Zhou Yuan did not linger. He nodded slightly to Elder Qin and the others, then, with Mei Ning in tow, left the village under the complex gazes of the villagers.

For the next period of time, Zhou Yuan, with Mei Ning by his side, relied on Ti Hun's sensitivity to Yin energy and soul power to travel through relatively safe areas of the Yin Netherworld, and successively visited and entered three or four mortal villages of varying sizes.

In almost every village, there are some monks who have fallen into this place.

Zhou Yuan approached them in a similar manner.

Either through trade or by demanding.

Collect as much as possible the valuable cultivation techniques, secret arts, elixir formulas, weapon-refining insights, records of rare materials, and other legacies or artifacts that these people previously carried.

Mei Ning's bundles grew larger and larger until finally she had to find a tough animal hide to make a large backpack, which was bulging with more than a hundred storage bags of various shapes and some miscellaneous items.

Carrying this bag that was bigger than her, Mei Ning didn't feel it was heavy at all. Instead, she felt a strange sense of security. These were all collected by her senior. Her senior's ambitions were indeed great!

"That's about it."

On this day, Zhou Yuan stood atop a low hill, gazing at the enormous shadow that loomed in the northeast, piercing the depths of the leaden-gray clouds, and said in a deep voice:

"Let's go, to Storm Mountain."

……

Storm Mountain.

Located on the northeastern edge of the Underworld, it is the most conspicuous and terrifying landmark in this realm.

From a distance, only half of the dark mountainside can be seen, like a giant pillar supporting the sky and earth, while the upper half is completely submerged in the rolling, thick, dark clouds, and its peak is not visible.

The entire mountain appears to be composed of pure, cold, black boulders, bare and devoid of any vegetation, with only jagged rocks and deep cracks.

Starting from a height of over a thousand feet, the fierce "Nether Wind" begins to howl year-round. This wind is no ordinary cold wind; it contains pure Yin energy and the power to extinguish evil spirits. It is icy cold, capable of freezing metal and stone, and eroding the soul.

Ordinary people, let alone climb it, could be instantly frozen into black ice sculptures by the escaping icy winds just by getting close to the foot of the mountain. The higher you go, the stronger and more terrifying the icy winds become.

Such an extreme environment made the area around the mountain dark, with blue arcs of electricity flashing more frequently and violently in the sky, accompanied by rolling thunder.

The ground was filled with flying sand and stones, and the howling wind was deafening, like a ghostly realm devoid of life.

However, it is precisely in this place where the Yin energy is extremely dense that the most powerful Yin beasts in the Yin realm have their favorite dens and hunting grounds.

On this day, this desolate land welcomed an uninvited guest.

"roar--!"

A roar filled with pain and rage shook the foot of the mountain, and a huge, dark beast, resembling a giant lizard but with three heads and standing thirty or forty feet tall, was struggling frantically.

Its body was firmly enveloped by a dazzling silver glow, which seemed to possess a terrifying devouring power. The dense black energy on the giant beast was forcibly drawn out like rivers flowing into the sea and disappeared into the depths of the silver light.

The beast's struggles quickly weakened, its massive body visibly shrunken and withered, finally collapsing to the ground, completely losing its life force, and turning into a giant dried corpse.

The silver light receded.

Enveloped in a large mass of pure black energy that had been devoured, it leaped dozens of feet away in a flash.

(This month, the story will return to the Tiannan arc!)