One quarter of an hour before Jiang Yizheng fell while holding Yang Lingzhu.
Ning Buwei was determined to force the mastermind out using a battle formation, with the Soul-Devouring Array stirring in his palm.
Chu Jun grasped his hand.
Although Ning Buwei knew he was trying to prevent him from rashly using the Soul-Devouring Array, when the warm and somewhat soft touch passed through his palm, he still had a momentary flight of fancy.
Chu Jun had the most beautiful hands he had ever seen, and of course… they felt nice to touch.
Whether in the past or present, Chu Jun seemed to always like stuffing things into his hand. He generally would not refuse, probably because what was given was always good. But this time, it was Chu Jun’s hand, just holding it didn’t seem quite proper. However, he was reluctant to let go.
At least the bastard opposite who refused to show himself for a long time didn’t have a great beauty holding his hand.
Ning Buwei turned his head and looked at Chu Jun, just meeting his somewhat faint gaze. The misty and dim candlelight cast a soft circle of light on his profile, with the small shadow of his eyelashes gently swaying.
Damn, he’s so good-looking.
Ning Buwei felt he was truly superficial. The formation he was controlling became somewhat uncontrolled, and he smashed it toward the opposite side with a crackling sound, carrying full ferocity and a hint of showing off.
Chu Jun’s gaze showed a trace of confusion. Ning Buwei slightly raised his chin at him, turning his head back with a serious expression to continue the battle formation, but he reached back and held Chu Jun’s hand, lightly scratching his palm.
Just as Chu Jun was about to withdraw his hand, Ning Buwei’s voice rang in his sea of consciousness. “Hold tight.”
As soon as the words fell, the narrow tomb passage where everyone was located suddenly flipped. At the moment of flipping, the blood lines connected to Ning Buwei’s hand converged into a single line, directly connecting to the person battling him.
That person gave him a slight smile.
“Pei Heguang,” Ning Buwei suddenly narrowed his eyes.
The location flipped, and the battle formation naturally interrupted. However, Pei Heguang clearly did not want the formation to end. Before everyone could react, he slapped a blood symbol onto the ice coffin. Everyone instantly and strangely changed positions, facing the ice coffin like stars surrounding the moon, and their consciousness gradually began to lose control.
Mingsang and Shen Xi promptly withdrew, preparing to rescue others at an opportune moment. On the other side, Ning Buwei did not rashly move forward. After exchanging a glance with Chu Jun, they prepared to break the formation together.
Just then, two indistinguishable black shadows suddenly fell from the sky, smashing directly onto the blood symbol on the ice coffin. Ning Buwei even saw the complex symbol being smeared into a mess, followed by an instant of frustration on Pei Heguang’s face, and then a familiar and terrified scream.
“Father, ahhhhh!”
For a moment, Ning Buwei wanted to turn and walk away.
Why! Why did a child always come to join the excitement every single time!?
Fortunately, he had a tiny bit of a father’s conscience that stopped him from immediately drawing his sword and creating a crack to hide in.
Jiang Yizheng first saw Chu Jun’s body transformed into Ning Buwei’s appearance. She immediately looked like she was saved, crawling and pulling Yang Lingzhu down from the ice coffin, scurrying over to the body, “Father, father, father!”
Chu Jun, controlling the body: “… Mm.”
Jiang Yizheng was shocked that she hadn’t been scolded. After a moment of shock, she grabbed the body’s sleeve and wouldn’t let go, asking in a small voice. “What… what is this scary place?”
“Tomb,” Chu Jun replied succinctly.
Jiang Yizheng was stunned, slowly releasing her grip. After a few breaths, she carefully pinched a small corner of the sleeve and asked in an extremely soft voice. “Venerable… Venerable?”
Chu Jun gave her a bland look, “Mm.”
Jiang Yizheng immediately became as docile as a quail, not daring to move.
Although the Venerable’s temper was much better than her father’s and always sided with them when her father was angry, she still felt the Venerable was difficult to provoke and very…dangerous. Her father might only beat them when angry, but if the Venerable got angry – although he had never been angry so far – it would be far more serious than just a beating.
Chu Jun, controlling the body, pulled Jiang Yizheng and Yang Lingzhu behind him.
With the blood formation destroyed, the cultivators who were nearly completely controlled finally awoke and saw where they were. Undoubtedly, this was the true main tomb chamber, and the tomb owner lay quietly sleeping in the ice coffin.
“There seems to be writing before the ice coffin,” Qingdan Sect’s Bu Qing, who was closest to the coffin, murmured. “Tomb of Yan Jinzhou…Unfilial disciple Ning Bu…Wei.”
As her voice fell, the previously noisy crowd suddenly became silent.
“This is actually Yan Jinzhou’s tomb?” someone asked in surprise.
But most of the cultivators were quite young and asked in confusion. “Who is Yan Jinzhou?”
“Yan Jinzhou was a wandering cultivator who was famous alongside Ning Xingyuan five hundred years ago. However, her reputation… was a notorious one.”
“Five hundred years ago, people would respectfully call Ning Xingyuan ‘Young Master Xingyuan’. But this Yan Jinzhou, although a genius, had a wild and unruly personality, without any semblance of a female cultivator. Her cultivation methods were quite unorthodox, and she later committed the atrocity of massacring the entire Yan family, a cruel and ruthless demoness.”
A Xie family member coldly snorted, speaking with contempt.
“No wonder she could teach such a great demon like Ning Buwei.”
“Everyone be quiet!” Shen Xi saw the surrounding chaos, “Although the battle formation has ended, the person who initiated the formation is still among us. Be careful not to be careless.”
With her words, the tomb chamber immediately fell silent, with everyone looking at each other.
In the vast tomb chamber, nearly a hundred cultivators occupied most of the space behind Shen Xi. Ning Fan occupied a corner, opposite the silent Zen Master Mingsang. In front of the ice coffin was the body holding the “child”, with Jiang Yizheng and Yang Lingzhu behind.
The four factions were clearly divided, but the formations in the tomb chamber were complex and ever-changing. The person hiding in the dark had not yet revealed themselves, obviously no one was willing to act rashly.
“Chu Bai found the flying ship,” Chu Jun said in Ning Buwei’s sea of consciousness. “Pei Heguang should have already seen through this trap.”
“Even if he’s seen through it, he’s not getting out today,” Ning Buwei’s tone was cold.
Because they were both bound by Yan Jinzhou’s blood lines and connected by a dao contract, Chu Jun naturally saw the memories left by Yan Jinzhou. These memories directly pointed to the existence of a sixth person outside the five of them, yet there was no definitive evidence of this sixth person’s existence.
But the person who could design both Ning Xingyuan and Yan Jinzhou was certainly not a good person.
“This Pei Heguang might not be his true body,” Chu Jun reminded him. “I can’t detect if this is a body double. His cultivation is likely above mine, and his primordial spirit could detach at any moment.”
Ning Buwei frowned.
Hinayana cultivators in the seventeen states could be counted on one hand, and those above Hinayana were even rarer. In these past few hundred years, Ning Buwei had rarely encountered even Fusion cultivators. But since Ning Xiu’s birth, he kept encountering God Transformation and Fusion cultivators, and Hinayana cultivators were no longer rare. Now, a master above Hinayana had even appeared.
This made Ning Buwei very unhappy that his son, who still wet the bed and could barely walk, was being so targeted.
“A piece of the Suzaku Broken Knife is with my master. It’s clearly aimed at me. He’s getting impatient,” Ning Buwei narrowed his eyes, with a small black insect appearing between his fingers. “I’ll go get the fragment. You stay hidden.”
Chu Jun didn’t let go. This insect was clearly modified by Ning Buwei, apparently intended to be used on Pei Heguang’s primordial spirit, a method of harming the enemy at great cost to oneself.
Ning Buwei turned to look at him.
Chu Jun said, “I have a way.”
“I know you have a way, but it will definitely make him realize you’re not dead. Wouldn’t the previous act be for nothing?” Ning Buwei hooked the corner of his mouth at him. “You’re the ace I’m keeping hidden and must be kept secret.”
Chu Jun’s gaze clearly showed disapproval. The next moment, Ning Buwei’s divine consciousness very directly entered his sea of consciousness, swept away a large amount of spiritual power, and then spread out his divine consciousness to wrap around Chu Jun’s divine consciousness, and then took advantage of his momentary daze to elegantly run away.
Chu Jun stiffened slightly, and Ning Buwei let go of his hand and rushed out.
“…………” Venerable Jinghe narrowed his eyes.
Ning Buwei moved extremely quickly. When he leaped into the air, he reached out, and the Suzaku Narrow Knife that was previously in the body’s hand instantly flew to his hand. Then he charged directly toward Yan Jinzhou’s ice coffin, both person and knife.
Almost the moment he moved, Zen Master Mingsang, Ning Fan, and Shen Xi all took action. Mingsang and Shen Xi intended to stop him, while Ning Fan wanted to open the coffin first. However, all three were blocked by the tomb’s formations controlled by Ning Buwei.
Just as Ning Buwei was about to touch the ice coffin, Pei Heguang, who had been observing quietly among the crowd, finally moved. In an instant, he had drawn his sword to block Ning Buwei.
Ning Buwei let out a cold laugh, raising his knife to slash at him, but Pei Heguang easily deflected it.
“Chengfeng, long time no see,” Pei Heguang effortlessly grasped the Suzaku Narrow Knife, giving him a familiar and gentle smile.
Ning Buwei’s expression changed dramatically. He said in a deep voice, “Who exactly are you?”
“Who you think I am, is who I am,” Pei Heguang seemed to have no intention of fighting him.
Ning Buwei stared at him intently, unwilling to miss even the slightest change in his expression, but found no flaws.
This gaze was too familiar to him. From the first time he saw the other party when he was five years old, to the last ordinary glance before leaving home.
The Suzaku Knife had never felt so heavy in Ning Buwei’s hand. He tried hard to steady his mind, but his voice still trembled slightly, “You’re actually—”
Pei Heguang’s eyes showed a hint of helplessness, his voice still very gentle, “You’ve always wanted me to appear, so here I am.”
