I imitate others' cultivation, and I will never reason with you.

Chapter 166 The Power of Number Three

While thinking about what to do next.

Two indigo lights came from the horizon.

Two old men in Taoist robes appeared in front of Ruan Xing. One of them held a whisk and had a red mole between his eyebrows, and the other had white hair and wore a gold ring necklace like a child.

One of them smiled warmly, "Fellow Daoist, congratulations on your beloved disciple's successful formation of the elixir. As the host, since we have witnessed this ceremony, we have to express our gratitude. Why don't you please stay at my Liuyang Study for a few days so that we can show our appreciation."

"That's not necessary. I am just passing by here with my disciple while traveling around." Ruan Xing declined.

"Oh? It's really an honor for us. This is the border of Nanzhou, a barren land with neither beautiful mountains nor beautiful waters, nor any blessed secret places. We are honored to have you condescend to come here, and we must treat you with courtesy." The old man said with a smile.

Ruan Xing frowned and protected the bewildered Ruan Tao behind him, "So, you really want to invite me to be your guest?"

I don’t know where the mistake went, but the people who came had bad intentions. These two people might be the Nascent Soul cultivators that Cai Wen mentioned, and they actually came out together.

The two men also knew that it was impossible to trick Ruan Xing back with just a few words, so their faces changed and they shouted loudly: "Daoyou, why do you have to tear your face and embarrass us!"

Seeing the two men coming aggressively, Ruan Xing sneered, "Swords are coming!"

A short sword appeared out of thin air in Ruan Xing's hand. She turned around and swung it, pinched her fingers together, and with the spiritual power surging through her body, thousands of silver-white sword lights suddenly appeared beside her, looming and illusory.

The old man holding the whisk did not dare to be careless. The whisk in his hand spread out, and the white silk threads were like a net, interweaving into a circular net. Thousands of sword lights fell into it, and only a few silk threads were cut off!
His face was solemn, and he felt a little sad about the white whiskers that were cut off from his whisk. Those were all spider silks worth thousands of spirit stones.

The white-haired old man took off the golden collar and flicked it gently. The collar became a ring more than one person tall, and the golden halo turned into mist. "Go!"

The golden ring passed through the gap in the net and quickly attacked Ruan Xing. At this time, the sword light in Ruan Xing's hand was almost used up, so he stopped attacking the net, but condensed it into a beam and flew towards the golden ring to collide with it. Suddenly, a large amount of golden mist spread, making a harsh sound like thick oil and sulfuric acid.

The old man with whisk dust immediately put away the net, looked at the bald whisk dust with anger, and cursed: "This villain, he attacked as soon as he disagreed with me, and he used all his strength when he attacked!"

In this way, he was even more certain that this strange middle-aged Taoist had ill intentions. There was a 90% chance that he was the one who destroyed the barrier. Otherwise, why would he be so resistant to going back to the mountain gate with him as a guest?
It is not an exaggeration to say that the fight between Yuanying stage cultivators would be earth-shaking. Unless there is a blood feud, they usually will not go to such a big battle. The main purpose of their trip is to trick the person back or capture him and carefully observe the clues. If the person has nothing to hide, he can get a valuable gift after going back with them and the truth is revealed. Liuyang Study has no shortage of these spirit stones.

Therefore, even if he felt that his status as a Yuanying Zhenjun was insulted and he was unhappy and wanted to take action, he would not use a killing move.

But Ruan Xing was completely unaware of all this, because... the few times she had fought with Yuanying stage opponents, were all fights of life and death.
What's more, she had no good feelings towards the people in Liuyang Study, and if they showed hostility, she would naturally use a killing move.

The old man with the whisk was about to step forward to help the old man with the golden ring. The two of them quickly captured the middle-aged Taoist priest and took him back to the sect. Suddenly, his pupils shrank and he shouted in surprise: "Be careful, he has helpers!"

However, he was too late. A pure white figure appeared behind the old man with the golden ring, and one hand curled into a claw and went straight for his heart. A golden light flashed on the old man's body, and half of his spiritual barrier was shattered. The sharp nails sank into the flesh, leaving deep blood marks. However, no matter how hard the sword was used, it could not get closer to the opponent's heart. His dark eyeballs moved slightly, and some green blood appeared on his hands.

The old man felt the pain, turned around and hit the pure white figure with the retracted golden ring. At such a close distance, Jian Lai's figure fell as fast as a meteor, and almost all the joints in his body were dislocated, but he still had no expression on his face. After landing, he rolled quickly and the whole person merged into the air again.

The moment the old man with the golden ring turned around, his eyes suddenly widened.

"burst!"

For a moment, the earth shook!
Ruan Xing didn't even look back, but grabbed Ruan Tao's arm, waved his sword under her feet, and used all his spiritual power to operate the sword-controlling technique to escape from this place.

This is Little Boy Number Three!

A self-destructive puppet made by Xu Shengping in the Nascent Soul stage!
She only has this one puppet at the Nascent Soul stage, and she hasn't tested it yet, so she doesn't know how powerful it is.

Just a second before she took action, she had already ordered the sword in the mind link, and using the concealed passage's concealment, she sent the little boy number three behind the two Nascent Soul cultivators.

Then Ruan Xing used the most powerful magic he knew at the moment, draining away half of his spiritual power to transform it into ten thousand sword lights, attracting the attention of the other two.

But at that time, the old man with the whisk was able to withstand her attack alone, and the old man with the golden ring still had enough strength to withstand it. This was when she needed to take the second step she had planned, which was to use Jian Lai to sneak attack the old man with the golden ring from behind. According to the positions of several people at that time, it would actually be less likely to be discovered by sneak attacking the old man with the whisk. However, in that case, the old man with the golden ring would most likely discover the little boy number three in advance and would have a few more seconds to respond, and Jian Lai would not have that much time to enter the hidden passage.

So, she deliberately let the old man with the whisk find out that she had a helper.

The ground beneath his feet was cracked, and the rocks and trees seemed to be tumbling in a blender. Ruan Xing tried his best to steer his flying sword straight ahead and into the sky, but he still could not escape the powerful force of the self-explosion. The shock wave caused by Little Boy No. 3 quickly caught up with Ruan Xing.

She suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood, staining the front of her Taoist robe red. The flying sword under her feet also tilted uncontrollably. The town ten miles away from the center of the explosion was also turned into ruins.

The flying sword fell rapidly, and Ruan Xing knelt on the ground tiredly. The soil around him was still shaking and falling slowly.

She thought to herself that this time the self-explosion would affect a larger area, but because this was an uninhabited wilderness, the town had no gates or city defense formations. If it was a self-explosion at the gate of Liuyang Study, it might not have such a great power. After all, Liuyang Study had a mountain defense formation and barrier.

She called out "Jian Lai" in the mind link, and when she felt the other party's response, she breathed a sigh of relief. At least Jian Lai was still there.

After wiping the blood off his chin, Ruan Xing used his spiritual power to sweep out a three-meter-wide flat ground, adjusted his posture and sat down. Then he took out a healing pill and took one himself, and fed one to Ruan Tao.

Looking at Ruan Tao, her heart sank.

The girl's face was as pale as gold paper, and bright red blood kept oozing out of her eyes, nose, mouth, and ears.

Even the healing pill that had just been fed to her turned into spiritual energy in her throat and then dissipated with the constantly gushing blood.

Ruan Tao was only in the early stage of the Golden Core stage and her cultivation was not yet stable. Even though Ruan Xing had taken her away immediately, she still could not withstand the shockwaves caused by the explosion.

Her spirit bones... were broken.

Even her meridians were broken, and she could no longer use her spiritual power to heal her injuries. If she didn't take corrective measures as soon as possible, her life would be in danger. However, this was a simulation.

Ruan Xing's reason told her that it would be useless to try to save Ruan Tao now, and she should use her precious simulation time to find a way to deal with Liuyang Study.

But she couldn't control her sadness when she had to watch Ruan Tao die in front of her.

"Axing, I seem... I still can't help..." Ruan Tao coughed up a mouthful of blood and spoke with some difficulty.

She felt so weak that she couldn't use any strength. Ruan Xing quickly held her hand and said, "It's okay, sister. I will find a way."

Ruan Tao is her only true love and bond in this world of immortal cultivation.

The pain made Ruan Tao frown, but she pulled the corners of her mouth, as if she still wanted to smile, "Ah Xing, you don't look good now... Can you return to your original appearance..."

Ruan Xing was stunned for a moment.

Her true form now is a girl of fifteen or sixteen years old, who looks older than Ruan Tao now.

She no longer looked like the person Ruan Tao was familiar with.

After a moment of silence, Ruan Xing used the illusion technique and turned into the eight-year-old Ruan Xing.

Amidst the ashes and ruins, a ray of golden light broke through the ground.

After a few seconds, there was a sudden bright light, and the golden ring emerged, splashing a lot of mud, rocks and gravel around it.

An old man staggered out, his body covered in a mixture of dust and blood, his flesh rotted inside out, one of his eyes missing, his scalp half exposed, and one could seem to see the white bones inside.

After spitting out a mouthful of blood, the old man with the golden ring took a healing pill and urged the golden ring to clean up the surrounding ruins. He then pulled a human figure out of the pit he had just crawled out of.

The old man with the whisk's injuries were lighter than the former, but he also looked very embarrassed. After taking the healing pill, he hurriedly made a gesture and took back a wooden carved mirror.

Just now, the two of them had to rely on the Sumeru Mirror to deal with the damage of a Nascent Soul Stage self-detonation. Even so, they both suffered serious injuries.

The two of them meditated for a while, and the old man with the golden ring opened his one eye, which was full of anger. He cursed: "What a bastard! He blew himself up just because we did something wrong! Is this a sick thing? Who is that person to make a Yuanying cultivator blow himself up for him without hesitation!"

According to some traditional immortal cultivators, during the Nascent Soul stage, the physical body is reshaped into an immortal body, and during the Spirit Transformation stage, the spirit is refined into an immortal soul. Only when both are perfected can one ascend from Guixu to the spiritual world.

In the explosion just now, nearly a quarter of his immortal body was destroyed, and he also lost an eye. Naturally, he hated the strange Taoist in his heart.

However, after being bombarded like this, he no longer had the arrogance he had when he first arrived. Instead, he began to wonder if that person had some background that he could not offend, and could only curse him a few words angrily.

But that shouldn't be the case. He had never heard of such a person in any sect. Moreover, that person called the girl next to him a disciple, which was not like the style of the Xizhou clan.

The old man with the whisk lowered his head in thought, then slowly shook his head, "Don't you find it strange? Even with the Sumeru Mirror, it's impossible for the two of us to survive the power of a Nascent Soul Stage self-detonation."

"What do you mean?" The old man with the golden ring looked at him puzzledly.

The old man with the whisk said confidently: "The person who blew himself up should have only 70% of the strength of a normal Nascent Soul cultivator at most."

The old man with the golden ring didn't quite understand. "This shouldn't mean anything. Our sect also has methods to quickly improve cultivation. I heard that there is a secret method in Xizhou to train dead warriors, which can quickly become high-level cultivators, but their lifespan is half of that of ordinary cultivators. Besides, that person might be a cultivator with defects or whose lifespan has reached the end of his life."

The old man thought for a moment and asked, "How is your injury just now?"

"What?" The old man with the golden ring was stunned for a moment before he understood what the other party said. "It should be fine. He didn't break my internal organs..."

As he spoke, he reached out his hand to touch his back. When he saw the dark green sticky blood, he immediately fell silent and his face darkened. "It's corpse poison!"

The two looked at each other and seemed to understand something.

The old man with the whisk said immediately, "And just now I saw through the Sumeru Mirror that he had traces of the Sumeru Realm's prohibition on his body."

"A rat who escaped from the Xumi Realm through a side door has actually reached the Nascent Soul stage without us noticing. We can't let him leave here alive!" A hint of cruelty flashed in the eyes of the old man with the golden ring. "He couldn't escape the self-explosion of the Nascent Soul stage. He must be injured now. He definitely doesn't have a spiritual weapon like the Xumi Mirror. The two of us have a good chance of winning."

What he said was exactly what the old man was thinking. He nodded slightly and said, "He can't run far. We can catch up with him within a radius of 20 miles. Besides, the little disciple beside him is just a golden elixir that has just passed the tribulation. If he doesn't stop to extend the life of the little disciple, she will die."

"But you..." The old man with the whisk had a little more worry in his voice, "It has been many years since the appearance of evil ghost cultivators in Nanzhou. The corpse poison is difficult to cure. I am afraid you will suffer for decades."

"I was careless." The old man with the golden ring sighed, "But it's okay. At least we can confirm that the person who peeped into the National Master's Palace that night was him. The evil ghost caught in the Xumi Realm yesterday should also be his. As long as we kill him, there will be no more mistakes in the Xumi Realm."

“But I still can’t figure it out. When our master and ancestor who founded the Xumi Realm six thousand years ago captured those mortals, didn’t he already screen them? There couldn’t be any skills in the Xumi Realm. How could there be an evil ghost cultivator in the Nascent Soul stage hiding there? I don’t know if he has had any impact on the dynasty’s fortune over the years…”

The old man with the whisk frowned.

The old man with the golden ring was a little impatient. "Who can know so much about what happened six thousand years ago? Maybe our ancestors made mistakes when they were doing things. Besides, when you and I were living in the Xumi Realm as mortals, we had never heard of any gods or ghosts. Don't doubt this or that. Come with me and kill the man first. The longer we delay, the more time he will have to recuperate, which will be more disadvantageous to us."

"You're right." The old man with the whisk stopped struggling and wiped the blood and mud off his face with his sleeve. "Let's go."

The two of them headed in the direction where Ruan Xing had just left.

(End of this chapter)