Chapter 655
The monster forest in early spring still had the chill of winter. The sound of Fu Shaoping breaking a dead branch startled a few iron-feathered birds. He pressed his left hand on the hilt of the sword, and the old injury on his right shoulder ached slightly - it was the injury caused by the poison arrow of the Xuanyin Sect three days ago. Although he took the fire ganoderma, the residual toxin still needed specific medicinal herbs to be completely removed.
"The Demonic Ape Valley is just ahead." Nangong Wan landed lightly from the treetops, and the purple flame condensed into the shape of a bird in his palm. "There are fresh claw marks at the entrance of the valley. Those beasts should have just returned to their nests."
Fu Shaoping looked up at the sky. The leaden clouds were very low, and the forest was filled with humid fog. This kind of weather was most favorable for the blood-eyed demon apes that relied on their sense of smell to hunt, but it was extremely disadvantageous for human monks who needed vision.
"We must evacuate before noon." He untied the leather bag at his waist and poured out two miasma-repelling pills. "The courtship period of the demon apes will last until the summer solstice. Now the entire tribe is in an excited state."
Nangong Wan's fingertips briefly lingered on his palm as she took the pill. Ever since Fu Shaoping blocked a ghost cultivator's attack for her when she took Youlan from the Yin-Yang Realm seven days ago, there had been more and more subtle touches between the two. She held the pill under her tongue, the purple flame swirled in the depths of her pupils, and her vision suddenly became clear.
The rock wall at the mouth of the valley was covered with dark red scratches, like some kind of ancient totem. The most eye-catching were three scratches that ran vertically through the entire rock wall, each three feet wide and more than half a foot deep into the rock wall.
"The territorial markings of adult males." Nangong Wan scraped off some stone chips with a dagger and sniffed them. "Mixed with the smell of rotten heart grass, they are preparing for the mating ceremony."
Fu Shaoping suddenly pressed her shoulders. Thirty feet away in the mist, two spots of scarlet light flickered. The red light was not a reflection, but came from the eyes of some creature. They both held their breath and slowly retreated behind a hemlock tree.
"Sentry." Fu Shaoping said in secret, "There is an old injury on the left forelimb. It was the one that was seriously injured by us last year."
Nangong Wan narrowed his eyes. A hunched outline gradually emerged in the mist. The creature was about two feet tall, covered with black hair like steel needles, and its forelimbs were so developed that they almost touched the ground when they were hung down. The strangest thing was its eyes. There were no pupils, only two balls of blood light that kept wriggling.
The demon ape suddenly stood up, its nostrils dilated. Fu Shaoping thought to himself that it was not good, and sure enough, the next second, a deafening roar resounded through the valley. Countless scarlet dots lit up in the mist, surrounding them from all directions.
"run!"
Sword light and purple flames burst out at the same time. Fu Shaoping's Xuanbing sword energy froze the first three demon apes into ice sculptures, while Nangong Wan threw out a string of fireballs, exploding brilliant purple fireworks among the apes. But this could only temporarily slow down their offensive, as more demon apes were climbing down from the rock wall.
"Cliff!" Nangong Wan pointed to the end of the valley. There was a narrow crack covered by vines, which was the only possible way to escape.
The two men fought and retreated back to back. Fu Shaoping's sword became heavier and heavier, and the wound on his right shoulder began to ooze black blood - the intense exercise made the residual toxins active again. Nangong Wan noticed his abnormality, and the purple flame suddenly surged, turning into a fire dragon circling around the two men.
"Take it!" She stuffed a jade bottle into Fu Shaoping's hand and said, "Pour it all into your mouth!"
The bottle contained concentrated essence of Fire Ganoderma Lucidum. The burning sensation when it entered his mouth made Fu Shaoping's eyes go dark. But the warm current that followed immediately suppressed the poison. He let out a long roar, and with the sword energy he chopped off two more ape heads.
When they were still a hundred feet away from the cliff, the ground suddenly shook. A giant beast twice as big as the other demon apes rushed over, smashing through trees. It had a crown of bones on its head and a necklace made of human skulls on its chest.
"Ape King!" Nangong Wan's face suddenly changed. This level of demon beast has already awakened its spiritual intelligence, which is equivalent to a human Jindan stage cultivator. She bit her tongue and sprayed a mouthful of blood on the purple flame, and the flame immediately condensed into a solid armor covering her whole body.
The ape king did not attack immediately, but beat his chest with his forelimbs, making a muffled sound like a war drum. The other demon apes dispersed as if they had received an order, forming an encirclement. Its blood-red eyes stared at Nangong Wan, and suddenly spoke in human language: "Purple flame. Bloodline. Delicious"
Fu Shaoping pointed the tip of his sword at the ground, and frost spread around him. This was the most energy-consuming "Thousand Miles of Ice" in the Xuanbing Sword Art. In his current state, he could only maintain it for ten breaths at most. But it was enough to create an opportunity for Nangong Wan.
“On the count of three,” he said, his voice eerily calm. “Use that trick.”
Nangong Wan's pupils contracted. Fu Shaoping was talking about a combined attack technique that they had studied for many years but had never used in practice - injecting the black ice sword energy into the purple flame core to create an ice and fire vortex. Theoretically, the power was enough to seriously injure a Jindan cultivator, but if it was not controlled well, it would hurt yourself first.
"one."
The ape king grabbed a huge rock and threw it at him. Fu Shaoping swung his sword to split it, and the broken rock left a bloody mark on his face.
"two."
Nangong Wan formed seals with his hands, and the purple flame condensed into a lotus shape in front of his chest. There was a faint blue light in the center of the flower, which was a ray of original sword energy that Fu Shaoping had brought in in advance.
"three!"
The ice and fire lotus shot out and exploded three feet in front of the ape king. The blue and white intertwined light waves spread in a circle, and the five demon apes closest to them were instantly vaporized, while those farther away were frozen into ice sculptures and immediately exploded into pieces. The ape king crossed his arms to block, and his bone crown shattered inch by inch, and his chest was charred.
But this attack exhausted the spiritual power of both of them. Fu Shaoping knelt on one knee, and the sword stuck in the ground to avoid falling. Nangong Wan was even worse. She was bleeding from all seven orifices due to the forced activation of the purple flame that exceeded her capacity, and her vision was blurred.
The ape king staggered a few steps and howled in pain. But he quickly stood firm, and the bloodshot in his eyes became more intense. The surviving demon apes gathered together again, and the closest one was less than twenty feet away from the cliff.
"It seems..." Fu Shaoping stood up with difficulty and held Nangong Wan's hand, "He is about to jump."
She returned the grip with surprising force: "Together."
The moment the ape king pounced, the two jumped off the cliff. The moment the feeling of weightlessness came, Fu Shaoping pulled Nangong Wan into his arms and protected her with his body. In his ears was the whistling wind and the unwilling roar of the ape king, and also - a strange sound of water?
The falling time was shorter than expected. The expected severe pain did not come, but was replaced by a cold touch and a suffocating feeling. Fu Shaoping realized in the chaos that they fell into the deep pool under the waterfall.
The current was so fast that it was beyond imagination. He desperately held onto Nangong Wan, but the huge impact still separated them. Something in the darkness wrapped around his ankles—not water grass, but it felt more like... fingers?
When the air in his lungs was about to run out, an undercurrent suddenly swept him in a certain direction. His back hit a hard object, followed by a feeling of weightlessness, and this time he fell on solid ground.
"Cough Nangong?" Fu Shaoping struggled to stand up and spit out a few mouthfuls of water. The surroundings were as dark as ink, with only a faint light in the distance. He fumbled to find the hilt of the sword, injected a trace of spiritual power, and the sword immediately emitted a faint blue light. The light illuminated an arched cave, with obvious traces of artificial excavation on the rock wall. The most eye-catching thing was the ground - a whole piece of green jade, with complex array patterns engraved on the surface, and at this moment, it was emitting a faint fluorescence as the sword light shone.
"Here." A weak response came from behind. Nangong Wan leaned against a stone pillar three meters away, with purple flames flickering at her fingertips. Her face was pale, but the light in her eyes showed that she was still conscious. "It's the ancient monk's water-avoiding formation."
Fu Shaoping walked over quickly and found a deep wound on her right calf that was visible to the bone. It might be scratched by the rock when she fell. He tore off the hem of her clothes to bandage it, and his heart tightened when he touched her skin - Nangong Wan's body temperature was abnormally low.
"There's something wrong with the water." She panted and pointed to the top of her head. With the sword light, she could see countless crystal silk threads interwoven into a net between the stalactites hanging from the cave ceiling, with water drops hanging at the end of each thread. "Thousands of years of cold marrow. One drop can freeze a foundation-building monk to death."
Fu Shaoping then noticed that there was also a thin layer of frost on the back of his hand. He practiced the Mysterious Ice Technique and unexpectedly found that the spiritual energy in his body was flowing much more smoothly than usual, and even the residual toxins were suppressed.
"Can you walk?" He helped Nangong Wan up and found that the blood vessels near her wound had been sealed by the cold air, so she would not lose too much blood for the time being. "There is light ahead, it may be the exit."
Nangong Wan nodded, but suddenly grabbed his wrist: "Wait." Her purple flames surged, illuminating the nearest stone pillar. There were a few ancient characters engraved on it, not the seal script commonly used in the current cultivation world, but both of them recognized it - "Xuan Dan".
"Xuan Dan Lao Ren?" Fu Shaoping's voice was tense. A thousand years ago, he was famous for his alchemy. It was said that the "Nine Turns Resurrection Pill" he refined could bring the dead back to life. But there have been many different opinions in the cultivation world about the location of his cave.
Nangong Wan's eyes sparkled with excitement: "If this is really his cave." Before he finished speaking, the ground suddenly shook. The jade array patterns lit up one by one, forming a huge Tai Chi pattern. Two stone statues rose from the Yin-Yang fish eye, one holding a pill furnace and the other holding a medicine pestle.
"The one who broke through the formation." The stone statue holding the alchemy furnace spoke in human language, and the voice was as rough as frosted sand. "Test your heart."
The stone statue holding a medicine pestle continued: "Experience."
"Soul test." Two voices sounded at the same time, echoing in the cave. The stone statue raised its hand stiffly, and the alchemy furnace and the medicine pestle struck each other, making a clear clanging sound.
Fu Shaoping immediately held his sword in front of him. As the sound rang out, the surrounding scene distorted and changed, and the stone wall melted like wax. When he regained his consciousness, he was standing in a sea of fire, and the heat waves burned his skin painfully. This was not an illusion - the corners of his clothes really began to burn.
"Nangong?" He turned to look for his companions, but saw a horrifying scene: Nangong Wan was chained to a copper pillar, purple flames were flowing out of her seven orifices, and were forcibly pulled out by some force. She raised her head in pain, and a scream that was not human came out of her throat.
The voice of the stone statue holding the alchemy furnace came from the depths of the sea of fire: "Purple flame spiritual roots, natural alchemy embryo. Leave her, you can live."
Fu Shaoping's sword tipped to the ground. This illusion pointed directly to the deepest fear in people's hearts - he had indeed worried countless times that Nangong Wan's purple flame would attract covetousness. But at this moment, anger overwhelmed fear.
"She's not made of it!" The Xuanbing sword energy exploded, and a gap was torn in the sea of fire. Fu Shaoping jumped in front of the copper pillar, and the moment the sword light cut through the chain, the illusion shattered like a mirror.
He returned to reality and found that Nangong Wan had just escaped from the illusion, with cold sweat on his forehead. The two looked at each other and saw fear in each other's eyes - they had experienced each other's most fearful scene.
The stone statue holding the pestle suddenly leaned forward, and the pestle pointed at Nangong Wan: "The second test is to refine the body."
The temperature of the cave suddenly rose. The ground array pattern turned red, and the heat wave distorted the air. Nangong Wan smiled, and the purple flame danced happily in his palm: "Comparing fire? That's exactly what I want!"
She formed seals with her hands, and the purple flames turned into nine fire birds that surrounded her body. When the heat wave hit, the fire birds connected head to tail to form a barrier. What was even more amazing was that part of the earth fire was absorbed and transformed by the purple flames, which made Nangong Wan's aura even stronger.
Fu Shaoping was not idle either. He noticed that there was a certain pattern between the movements of the two stone statues and the changes in the ground array. When Nangong Wan survived the seventh wave of ground fire, he suddenly swung his sword and stabbed at a certain part of the base of the stone statue holding the alchemy furnace.
"Stop!" The stone statue roared in shock and anger, but it was too late. The moment the sword tip pierced in, the entire formation made a humming sound as if it could not bear the heavy load. The two stone statues froze in place, and then - a teeth-grinding sound of shattering came from the inside.
"What are you doing?" Nangong Wan looked at the cracked stone statue in surprise.
Fu Shaoping sheathed his sword and said, "The core of the formation is at the bottom of the furnace. The Theory of the Origin of Alchemy and Instruments left by Elder Xuan Dan mentioned that a truly good alchemist would hide his weakness in the most conspicuous place."
The stone statue completely shattered, revealing the jade slip hidden in its chest. Nangong Wan picked it up and examined it, breathing rapidly: "It's the recipe! But only the upper half."
Fu Shaoping moved closer and saw the words "Nine-turn Nirvana Pill" written at the beginning of the jade slip, followed by the names of dozens of medicinal materials and preliminary processing methods, but the key refining steps were missing.
"I need the lower half." Nangong Wan put away the jade slip and looked into the depths of the cave. After the array pattern was extinguished, a corridor appeared there, with a bronze door at the end. The yin-yang fish pattern on the door was missing the eyes. "It seems that I have to complete all the tests."
The sight in front of the bronze door made the two stop. There was a long-burning lamp on each side of the door. The lamp oil was actually solidified amber, and the wick was a crystal bone. The strangest thing was that the flames of the two lamps were different colors - green on the left and red on the right, reflecting the yin-yang fish as if it was slowly rotating.
"A lamp made of mermaid fat will last for a thousand years." Fu Shaoping recognized the origin of the lamp oil. The Xuanyizhi records that it is a rare item made from mermaid fat. But what alerted him was the groove on the door, which was exactly the shape of two jade slips.
Nangong Wan has already taken out the half of the recipe he just obtained: "Looks like I have to put it in."
"Wait." Fu Shaoping stopped her. "The Yin-Yang fish requires balance. We only have the Yang Book, but not the Yin Book."
She pondered for a moment, and suddenly took out the bronze fragment she got from the Yin-Yang world from her storage bag: "The Xuanyin Sect is chasing this so closely, could it be..." As she spoke, she pressed the fragment against the Yin fish's eye. A miracle happened. The fragment fit in perfectly, and the Yin fish's eye lit up with a faint blue light. Seeing this, Fu Shaoping put half of the jade slip of the elixir recipe into the Yang fish's eye, and the Yang fish's eye immediately glowed with a warm yellow halo.
The bronze door slid open silently, and a strong medicinal aroma hit me. In the center of the alchemy room stood a three-foot-tall jade tripod, with a star map engraved on the body and three coiled dragons on the legs. On the stone table behind the tripod, the lower half of the jade slip of the alchemy formula lay quietly in a crystal box.
"It went so smoothly." Fu Shaoping did not draw his sword, but his spiritual power was already running to the limit. It was impossible for the old man Xuandan to let people take away the most important pill formula with only two tests.
Sure enough, at the moment when Nangong Wan's fingertips touched the crystal box, the jade tripod suddenly vibrated. The three tripod-legged dragons opened their eyes, and the dragon mouths spewed out blue, red, and white flames that intertwined into a net, trapping Nangong Wan in it. (End of this chapter)