Chapter 63: Tracking

Chen Ping didn’t linger. He continued drifting with the astral winds.

Beneath the grey, overcast sky, mountain ranges stretched endlessly, dotted with the occasional ruined palace remnants.

Those ruins had existed for who knows how many tens of thousands of years, long since ravaged beyond recognition by the erosion of the astral winds.

Only broken walls and crumbling foundations remained, silently telling of past glories.

Chen Ping relaxed his body, letting the astral winds carry him along.

The Great Dao Primordial Power shielded him entirely; the astral winds, fierce enough to shred Golden Cores and erode Nascent Souls, could not affect him in the slightest.

As he drifted, he suddenly sensed something off.

His gaze swept over a valley below.

There, a faint layer of black mist hung over the area.

The mist was so thin that ordinary cultivators couldn’t perceive it at all.

But under Chen Ping’s Grand Dao Divine Eyes, the black mist had nowhere to hide.

It wasn’t ordinary fog; it was a barrier formed from some kind of cold, yin power.

Deep within the black mist, a pair of eyes could be vaguely seen.

They were cold and dark, exuding an indescribable eeriness.

But the moment Chen Ping looked at them, they vanished.

The black mist also slowly dispersed, as if it had never been there at all.

Chen Ping raised an eyebrow slightly.

Interesting.

He made a mental note of this place and continued drifting away with the astral winds.

*

On the other side.

After entering the secret realm, Lin Xiaoyu stood there, somewhat nervous.

This was her first time leaving her master’s side, facing the unknown world alone.

Around her was a dense primeval forest; the trees towered into the clouds, blotting out the sun.

The air was thick with the damp scent of plants and earth, mixed with a vague, ancient aroma.

From time to time, the roars of demonic beasts echoed in the distance, making her heart race.

But she took a deep breath and forced herself to calm down.

“Master always said, ‘Caution keeps the ship sailing for ten thousand years…’” she murmured softly.

In her eyes, golden lightning faintly surfaced.

The Eye of Heavenly Punishment activated.

In her vision, everything became crystal clear.

The auras of beasts lurking in the shadows, the traces of restrictions hidden among the foliage—nothing could escape her sight.

And she hadn’t forgotten her most important task upon entering this secret realm: gathering heavenly materials and earthly treasures.

Resources.

A massive amount of resources.

She needed them to break through the bottleneck at the twenty-fifth layer of Qi Refining and push toward the thirty-sixth layer, the Great Perfection.

But where should she go?

Lin Xiaoyu felt a moment of confusion.

Just then, two figures swept overhead.

They were two Golden Core cultivators, one tall and one short, dressed in azure robes.

Their attire suggested they were disciples from some subordinate faction.

They were in a hurry, as if rushing somewhere.

An idea sparked in Lin Xiaoyu’s mind.

She quietly activated the Heavenly Dao Evasion Art and followed them.

For several hours straight, the two pushed on at top speed, crossing ancient forests, leaping over mountain streams, without a moment’s rest.

Lin Xiaoyu followed from a distance, her curiosity growing.

Where are they going?

Why are they in such a hurry?

Another half hour passed. The two finally came to a halt.

Lin Xiaoyu hid behind a massive boulder and cautiously peeked out.

Ahead lay a dark, gloomy canyon.

Its entrance was narrow, with sheer rock walls soaring into the clouds on both sides, blocking most of the light.

The depths of the canyon were pitch black; it was impossible to see what was inside.

Only gusts of chilling wind blew out from the canyon, carrying a bone-deep cold.

The tall man gazed at the canyon entrance, excitement gleaming in his eyes.

“Senior Brother, is this the place?”

The shorter man nodded, pulled out a map from his robe, and carefully compared it.

“Mm. My cousin came here the last time he entered the secret realm.

He said there’s an inheritance left behind by an ancient expert…”

He paused, then lowered his voice:

“It’s very likely the inheritance of a Dao Severing Expert.”

The tall man’s eyes lit up.

“A Dao Severing Expert?!”

“Shh, keep it down!” The shorter man glared at him.

“My cousin said he’d already reached the entrance to the inheritance last time. Unfortunately, the secret realm’s time ran out, and everyone was forcibly ejected.

This time, we have to seize the opportunity!”

The two exchanged a glance, their eyes filled with greed and excitement.

Then, without the slightest hesitation, they strode straight into the canyon.

Lin Xiaoyu, still hidden behind the boulder, had heard every word clearly.

A Dao Severing Expert’s inheritance?

Her heartbeat quickened.

But she quickly calmed down again.

“Master always said, ‘The greater the opportunity, the greater the danger.’ I need to be careful…”

She bit her lip, and in the end, followed them anyway.

If I don’t go in and look, how will I know what it is?

Besides, she had the Heavenly Dao Evasion Art and the Eye of Heavenly Punishment. Even if there was danger, she’d be able to sense it early.

Inside the canyon, the chilling wind blew in bursts.

The deeper they went, the darker it became.

The stone walls on both sides were covered in strange moss that glowed a faint green, barely lighting the path ahead.

Lin Xiaoyu followed the two at a distance, keeping her Eye of Heavenly Punishment active and remaining vigilant of her surroundings.

About the time it took for an incense stick to burn passed. A low, rumbling roar suddenly sounded from up ahead.

It was Yin Soldiers. A squad of Yin Soldiers charged out of the darkness, their bodies wreathed in greyish-white mist, wielding rusty spears as they lunged at the two cultivators.

These Yin Soldiers weren’t very strong—mostly at the Qi Refining stage, with only a few at Foundation Establishment.

The two cultivators were startled at first, then overjoyed.

“Senior Brother, these Yin Soldiers… after we kill them, that mist seems to strengthen the soul!”

“Really?”

The two of them joined forces and quickly slaughtered the squad of Yin Soldiers.

As expected, the greyish-white mist didn’t dissipate but instead flowed into their bodies.

They closed their eyes and savored the sensation for a moment, their faces full of pleasant surprise.

“Excellent! Let’s keep going!”

Lin Xiaoyu continued following from afar, without interfering.

Under her Eye of Heavenly Punishment, she saw the true nature of those Yin Soldiers clearly.

They were merely death qi condensed by some kind of formation; killing them did indeed strengthen the soul.

But absorbing too much would also leave hidden dangers within the body.

The two men clearly hadn’t noticed that.

The more they killed, the more exhilarated they became, and the deeper they ventured.

The canyon grew darker and darker. The Yin Soldiers grew more and more numerous.

Qi Refining Stage, Foundation Establishment Stage, Golden Core Stage…

When the first wave of Golden Core Stage Yin Soldiers appeared, the two men’s expressions finally shifted.

“Senior Brother, this… isn’t this a bit too much?”

Back to back, they fought with everything they had, but the Yin Soldiers seemed endless – kill one wave, and another surged in to take its place.

The taller man’s face went pale.

“Senior Brother, maybe we should call it quits? It’s too dangerous here…”

The shorter man gritted his teeth, a flash of madness in his eyes.

“What’s there to be afraid of? Fortune favors the bold! As long as we don’t run into any Nascent Soul Stage Yin Soldiers…”

He pulled a talisman from his robes and clutched it in his hand.

“Even if we do, we can escape in an instant! I spent a fortune on this Void Evasion Talisman!”

The taller man glanced at the talisman in his hand and felt a little more at ease.

The two pressed on.

*

They walked for the time it takes an incense stick to burn.

Ahead, the space suddenly opened up.

It was an enormous underground cavern, a full hundred zhang across.

Embedded in the ceiling were countless deep-blue crystals, casting a faint, ghostly glow that made the entire space look like a realm of the dead.

And at the very center of the space…

A pitch-black ancient tree stood in silence.

The tree was about five zhang tall, its trunk like ink, its branches and leaves like ice.

The canopy was heavy with densely clustered fruit.

Each fruit was the size of a fist, jet black, with a swirling blue luminescence flowing across its surface.

A rough count put them in the hundreds, at least.

“Yin Nether Fruit!”

The shorter man cried out, wild joy flooding his eyes.

“We’re rich! So much Yin Nether Fruit – at least several hundred!

If we sell this, the resources would be enough to cultivate all the way to the Nascent Soul Realm!”

The taller man was trembling with excitement too.

“Senior Brother, we’ve struck it rich!”

The two exchanged a glance, then rushed toward the ancient tree in unison.

*

Lin Xiaoyu watched the scene unfold from her hiding place.

Through the Eye of Heavenly Punishment, she could see the true nature of those Yin Nether Fruits with perfect clarity.

They were indeed rare treasures of heaven and earth, containing immense yin-cold power.

Invaluable to anyone cultivating yin-attribute arts.

But she could also see something else – each fruit was wreathed in an extremely faint, almost imperceptible black qi.

That black qi… it was dangerous.

She wanted to call out and warn them, but it was already too late.

The two had already reached the tree, their hands reaching out to pluck the Yin Nether Fruit.

*

The moment their fingers touched the fruit…

Disaster struck!

The Yin Nether Fruit transformed into a stream of black qi and surged straight into their bodies.

“Not good!”

Their faces twisted in alarm. They tried to let go, only to find their hands seemingly fused to the branches, completely impossible to pull free.

More and more Yin Nether Fruit dissolved into black qi, flooding into them in a frenzy.

The black qi was cold as ice, bone-chilling, dense with yin-cold power that rampaged through their meridians with unstoppable force.

The two tried to circulate their qi and force it out, but the black qi clung to them like a parasite burrowed into their very bones. It could not be expelled.

“Senior Brother… I… I feel my life force draining away…”

The taller man watched in horror as his hair turned white before his very eyes, his skin beginning to sag and wrinkle.

As if decades had passed in a single instant.

The shorter man was faring no better.