Chapter 136: Lotus Soil

Even with the skeletal battle slave to cushion the fall, Hu San was left in a battered and wretched state. He had no idea where he had been hurled, feeling only a persistent, roaring buzz inside his head. Standing straight was an immense struggle, let alone engaging in combat. Before he could even survey his surroundings, countless boulders and timbers came crashing down from the sky with a thunderous roar. His vision went completely black, and he could no longer see a thing as he was thoroughly and deeply buried beneath the debris.

In truth, the spot where Hu San landed was not far from the original location of the stone tower. Because the skeletal battle slave absorbed the brunt of the impact, Hu San had borne the full force of that terrifying shockwave, launching him high into the air before plunging back down. He landed right back on the islet at the center of the pond, though near its outer edge.

By this time, the people on the islet had recovered from their shock, though their reactions varied wildly.

The subordinates of the First and Second Young Masters were overjoyed. The terrifying corpse-creatures that had previously been completely unstoppable had somehow melted away on their own. Now that their adversaries were reduced to mere two individuals, their odds of victory were overwhelming, no matter how formidable those two might be.

With the terror of death lifted, the thought of the promises made by the two young masters should they succeed sent a thrill of ecstasy through the crowd. Glancing back at the two terrifying powerhouses on the opposite side, though still intimidating, they now appeared like treasures hidden within complex traps—fraught with danger, yet immensely precious and undeniably coveted.

As for the First Young Master and Second Young Master, their elation knew no bounds. Beneath the lingering traces of despair in their eyes, a boundless madness instantly surged forth.

On the other side of the battlefield, Madam Yu and her entourage were equally astonished and relieved by the enemy's sudden demise. They cast apprehensive glances toward the abruptly collapsing tower and the cascading rubble, their hearts caught between joy and anxiety.

They rejoiced in having narrowly escaped a catastrophe; had they waited a moment longer, the opposing faction's deadliest members wouldn't even have needed to strike, as the army of corpse-creatures alone would have slaughtered them to the last man. Yet, anxiety gnawed at them regarding the completion of their mission.

According to reliable intelligence, the suddenly collapsed stone tower was inextricably linked to the ultimate secret. With the tower now in ruins, whether they could still accomplish their mission remained an open question.

"How could this be? How could this be?"

Opposite these two factions, Old Master Yu, who had been observing the battle alongside his natal spirit corpse, suddenly stiffened. He watched helplessly as his hard-cultivated elite troop of warrior corpses was utterly obliterated beneath the moonlight, followed by the collapse of the stone tower. By the time he reacted, everything had already transpired, beyond any possibility of reversal.

A dense, emerald glow flashed in his eyes. At this moment, Old Master Yu resembled a lone wolf wandering the plains, staring with a hysterical gaze at the crumbling stone tower and the dancing ghosts lingering above it, while a sharp, wrenching pain gripped his heart.

How could he not recognize those ghosts? They were the entities summoned by the Myriad Ghost Banner he had bestowed upon Yu Ning. With the Myriad Ghost Banner activated, it was glaringly obvious that something momentous had occurred at the stone tower. Yet Old Master Yu had no need to rush to the rescue, for the entire tower had already collapsed. Even without the banner's activation, he would have known something had changed—he was not blind!

"Ning'er!"

A piercing, mournful wail echoed across the islet. At that moment, Old Master Yu's emotions were in extreme turmoil. He could not tell whether his heartache stemmed from the loss or destruction of the supreme-grade Nether Spirit Herb—the key to bridging the rift between him and his wife—or from despair over the death of a child into whom he had poured his life's efforts, or perhaps from the paralyzing fear that the Lotus Soil, which belonged to the venerable Patriarch Ge, might have been stolen by someone else.

In short, at that very moment, Old Master Yu completely lost his sanity.

"Go up and seize him!"

Almost simultaneously, Madam Yu and the two young masters issued the exact same command to their subordinates.

Facing the solitary, aging man—and despite knowing he possessed extraordinary cultivation—the herd mentality flared up among the overwhelming majority of their forces. To them, the old man before their eyes had transformed into a prize of honor and riches. At the command, the hundreds of warriors from both factions surged forward without a moment's hesitation.

"Capture those two unfilial wretches and that vile woman alive; I want to interrogate them thoroughly. Kill everyone else."

The bone-chilling words were spat out one by one from Old Master Yu's mouth. The natal spirit corpse, which normally required only a single thought to direct, was instead commanded through spoken words, revealing the sheer magnitude of the hatred boiling within his heart.

The natal spirit corpse, which had been standing quietly to the side, stepped forward. Each stride covered twice the distance of an ordinary person's pace. Though seemingly unhurried, in the blink of an eye, it intercepted the oncoming army of warriors.

Old Master Yu merely glanced indifferently at his two deranged sons before turning his back on them, his expression laden with profound gravity and grim resolve.

Though consumed by a burning, incandescent rage, Old Master Yu had not completely lost his mind. He reasoned that even if it were himself, lacking any prior knowledge of the Nine-Yin Blood-Surged Grand Array, he could not have silently infiltrated the third floor of the stone tower, let alone completely sever the entire array without triggering its protective seals.

Since the intruder had managed to achieve this feat, their cultivation could not possibly be low. However, they were unlikely to be vastly superior to him; otherwise, they would not have resorted to covert, sneaking methods. The most probable scenario was that the opponent possessed a cultivation level comparable to his own, coupled with mastery over some form of concealment technique.

Furthermore, the intruder had inadvertently triggered the trap mechanism of the Nine-Yin Blood-Surged Grand Array. No matter how high their cultivation might be, sustaining severe injuries was virtually unavoidable. Despite his reluctance to admit it, Old Master Yu knew in his heart that even if he had been in their shoes, surviving that strike without severe injury would have been a miracle.

Therefore, Old Master Yu possessed the courage to fight this opponent. Regardless of whether his daughter and the supreme-grade Nether Spirit Herb still existed, the absolute priority was to retrieve the Lotus Soil belonging to Patriarch Ge. Otherwise, once Patriarch Ge emerged from seclusion, not only would he die without a burial site, but his wife's family would likely suffer a catastrophic fate as well. Such ancient monsters operated entirely outside the bounds of reason.

By this time, Old Master Yu's spirit corpse had already plunged into the throng of warriors, unleashing a bloody massacre. With its cultivation at the fourth stage of Qi Gathering, coupled with terrifying corpse poison and a zombie's invulnerability to swords and spears, dealing with this group of warriors was no different than a tiger entering a flock of sheep. In less than the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, blood was flowing like rivers across the islet.

The warriors who had intended to flee were horrified to discover that, at some unknown point, the white jade bridge that once connected the islet had vanished entirely.

Some panic-stricken unfortunates recklessly leaped into the blood-red waters, only to utter miserable shrieks the moment they entered. Blood streamed from their facial orifices as they slowly went limp and sank into the water. The liquid was laced with a horrifying toxin; even protective Qi was utterly incapable of blocking the poison's invasion.

As the warriors gradually sank into total despair, the complexions of the two young masters and Madam Yu grew increasingly ashen. The slaughter continued unabated, yet Old Master Yu paid not the slightest heed to the carnage, keeping his gaze locked entirely upon the ruins before him.

"Fellow Daoist, please step out and show yourself. We can discuss whatever matters you have in a civilized manner."

Old Master Yu finally spoke up, unable to restrain himself any longer, but he was destined to receive no reply.

"It seems Fellow Daoist is determined to fight Yu to the bitter end. In that case, do not blame Yu for being impolite."

After a brief pause to compose himself, Old Master Yu's expression actually grew calmer. Seeing that the opponent still made no move, he retrieved several defensive talismans from his spatial storage stone, slapping them onto his body in rapid succession. Having secured his personal defenses, he then activated two magical artifacts he had refined over many years.

One was a pale-yellow miniature bell. The moment it appeared, it hovered above his crown, releasing a yellow barrier of light that completely enveloped him, forming a tight, skin-hugging shield. Beyond that lay the overlapping defense barriers generated by the various talismans.

Old Master Yu truly lived up to his reputation as a veteran of numerous battles. His primary consideration before entering combat was absolute personal defense—an essential precaution in battles among immortal cultivators.

Having brought his personal defenses to the pinnacle of perfection, Old Master Yu began directing his second magical artifact: an ink-black iron ruler. At his mental urging, the ruler slid continuously through the space before him, and within the blink of an eye, the space in front of him was filled with countless illusory phantoms of the iron ruler.

Whether scattered boulders or architectural timber, any object caught within the range of the iron ruler's phantoms suffered indiscriminate devastation, pulverized into fine powder within mere breaths.

With several layers of defensive talismans shielding his body, protected by a defensive magical artifact, and wielding the mysterious iron ruler as his instrument, Old Master Yu advanced toward the ruins like a slow-moving bulldozer. In the blink of an eye, he had cleared away most of the debris, arriving precisely at the original site of the stone tower.

Reaching this spot, Old Master Yu grew even more cautious. He abruptly surged his mana output into the iron ruler. The illusory phantoms, which had previously covered a mere four or five-zhang radius before him, suddenly expanded, engulfing a ten-zhang radius around him and enclosing his own position within the protective zone as well.

Viewed from afar, the energy-manifested zone of the iron ruler resembled a semi-spherical black sphere, covering Old Master Yu seamlessly at its center and advancing steadily forward with his footsteps.

Wherever it passed, every single object within the reach of its power was thoroughly pulverized.

"How can this be? Could it be that the intruder wasn't after the Lotus Soil after all?"

After painstakingly clearing away the stone tower's ruins, Old Master Yu still found no trace of the intruder. He had initially assumed the person must have fled elsewhere, but the sight that suddenly greeted his eyes shattered that assumption.

Right before him, within the area enveloped by the black ruler's power, a jade platform was rapidly fracturing. As the platform splintered, a pool of blood-red liquid slowly seeped out from within.

Touched by the passing wind, the liquid gradually solidified, ultimately transforming into a crimson, mist-like gas cloud that spun slowly in mid-air.

The iron ruler's dark phantoms, which usually pulverized everything they touched, struck this mist cloud to no effect whatsoever, failing to stir even the slightest ripple. Yet upon seeing this, far from being astonished, Old Master Yu's face finally broke into an expression of unadulterated ecstasy for the very first time.

Indeed, this object was none other than the Lotus Soil that Old Master Yu feared losing above all else—the very treasure Hu San desired most within the Yu Family Estate.

It was no exaggeration to say that Old Master Yu cared little if the entire estate or even the supreme-grade Nether Spirit Herb were lost; his sole anxiety centered upon this Lotus Soil. As long as the Lotus Soil remained intact, his Yu Family Estate could not be considered utterly doomed.

Compared to the matter of the Lotus Soil, everything else was secondary and could be postponed, including the life of his own precious daughter.