The Chu had been taken down by the Queen Mother of the West’s own miasma. Yu Chang wouldn’t have had time to rescue her even if he had wanted to.

A beam of sword energy like the wrath of heaven smashed the border inscriptions of both Chu and Li encampments, tore right through the immovable miasma fog, and in a flash surged up in front of Lord Guang’an. Like a piece of paper in a hurricane, this ascended spirit sword cultivator who had laid siege to Xuanwu in the South Sea was held down by that sword energy, unable to resist. In an instant, he was gone.

The Queen Mother of the West’s dismay hadn’t even had time to appear on her face!

But the sword energy had yet to stop. Going in the direction the west wind was blowing from, it split apart the whole Chu mining area at once and surged towards the South Sea.

Though Wangge Luobao was caught off guard, his reaction was extremely swift. In a flash, he blew a sharp whistle inaudible to the human ear. The ships on the water were tightly wrapped in spiritual energy and sank into the sea. All the waking dragons underwater flew out, swapping places with the ships.

The dreamlike sacred beasts let out frightened wails, but they couldn’t disobey a beast tamer’s command. They shielded the ships with their bodies. The sword energy fell in the South Sea with a boom, cutting a “wound” ten li long in the sea. The seawater on either side took a long time to fall. The blood of the waking dragons dyed that sea trench a dense, milky white.

Even Wei Chengxiang and the others hidden in Southern Wan’s mining area felt it. The Emperor of the East gripped the incessantly buzzing Emperor of the East Halberd in terror. All the established foundations and half-immortals locked in battle on the ground momentarily forgot to breathe.

Xi Ping was far away in the Xuanyin Mountains, but that sword energy seeped from the reincarnation wood amulets in the hands of each Turmoiler and each Luwu, sweeping out in front of him. He immediately pulled his consciousness out and leaned back. He practically had the illusion of having his throat cut by the sword light.

Oh no. The shard of Zhaoting was still in his spirit!

In his desperation, Xi Ping’s first reaction was to make a shield of his consciousness, acting as a firm barrier between the two famous swords of the north and south, taking on all the sword energy from Wanshuang without letting a thread leak out.

His consciousness was nearly cut open by the sword energy. He took a breath, and his back was already soaked. There was a chill on his face—a cut on his left cheek ran all the way down to the corner of his mouth. In the blink of an eye, the cut was healed by the formidable restorative powers of an ascended spirit.

This was…the extant pinnacle of the way of the sword.

Upon making an appearance, she had cleared away all the interwoven schemes and intrigues on the continent!

The whole of the Southern He Peninsula trembled in the midst of that attack. Before the major and minor evil cultivators could come to their senses, in the miasma-congested dense fog of Western Chu, a mountain of a “person” slowly walked out, half a head taller than even the steam cars in the Chu mines.

The half-puppets on the southern continent primarily used Moon Plated Gold and wood to make up for shortcomings in the human body; the lighter the material, the better. Xi Yue had been lighter than a wool blanket when he was little, so a mortal young man could pick him up one-handed and run all over the mountain with him.

But this Sword Slave from Northern Li was extremely heavy. The ground trembled beneath her feet. Each step carried the distinctive trill of a sharp blade slicing the air. The inscriptions on the ground in the Chu mines were like water, breaking apart where she stepped and “rippling” outward in all directions. In the blink of an eye, the better part of the Chu mining area’s defenses had crumbled!

The better part of her body was a heap of ghastly pale bone jade, with metal varying in hue and texture exposed at the joints. At a glance, the metal looked like a random pile of scraps, but from every bit of it came a harsh energy. If you stared at it casually, it would pierce your eye and unsettle your spiritual sense—it was said that the iron in the Sword Slave’s body wasn’t mundane iron, but the shards of a hundred and eight sword cultivators’ vital swords. She was like a walking sword crypt.

This was what Xi Ping saw through the reincarnation wood amulet of a Luwu in Chu’s mining area.

This Luwu was pretending to be a traveling merchant. He had fallen under the tables and chairs along with the other travelers and put a poison repelling pill from Rosy Cloud Peak in his mouth. Though it wasn’t the right antidote, it could still ameliorate the effects. The Queen Mother of the West’s strong poison hadn’t taken him down, but the sword energy that the Sword Slave brought with her as she passed nailed him firmly in place. Xi Ping distinctly sensed that the half-immortal Luwu didn’t breathe for a long moment.

The moment he saw that person…that sword-wielding puppet, Xi Ping understood why the Sword Slave didn’t take the southern continent seriously, and why san-ge had said that Great Wan couldn’t oppose Northern Li under any circumstances—they would have no chance at all.

And apart from her, Northern Li had three other shed skin sword cultivators and a dozen ascended spirits!

Xi Ping wiped the blood off his face. A thread of his consciousness curled up in the Luwu’s palm, which was covered in cold sweat. He began giving earnest consideration to A-Xiang’s suggestion of going to hang himself at the Sword Slave’s doorstep.

Where the Sword Slave passed through Chu’s mines, gas lamps exploded, train tracks snapped, burning boilers and passing cars were soundlessly extinguished, their casings slowly cracking open—she seemed to hate all of these machines. “Evil cultivators are openly hiding in Chu. It seems that Western Chu’s mining area has escaped the Sanyue Mountains’ control. The death penalty may be dealt.”

As she spoke, she had already arrived in front of the Queen Mother of the West. In her face overgrown with rifts, a pair of eyes like inanimate objects looked down, fixing on the Queen Mother of the West’s face.

The Queen Mother of the West seemed to have been frozen. The Sword Slave coldly said, “Yang clan remnant, I hear that you people recently joined hands and nearly brought down the Lingyun Mountains. Do you think that all orthodox cultivators of the immortal mountains are worthless wretches like those Shu cowherds?”

Yang Wan was trembling. As hot sweat steamed off her, it actually turned to frost in the sultry heat of the Southern He Peninsula, coating all her finery.

“Toying with diabolical inventions to the point of forfeiting your nation’s blessings.” The Sword Slave snorted quietly. “Is your Lancang Sect worthy of being called the ‘sword sect’?”

No sooner had she spoken than the protective armor the Queen Mother of the West wore abruptly cracked open. Xi Ping’s field of vision suddenly cleared—the spiritual energy stirred up by that protective immortal tool that was of at least ascended spirit grade practically turned into a hurricane, blowing the roofs off all the buildings in the area!

When the gale had passed, the miasma that had been covered up hit the Sword Slave right in the face at extremely close range. The part of it that fell on the ground corroded it, making a hole. The Queen Mother of the West got on a sword and was about to leave.

But the Sword Slave shifted her heels slightly. Unflinchingly, she raised a hand and grabbed the deadly miasma.

The Sword Slave’s protective spiritual energy was at least as thick as Xi Tai Sui’s face; even Jinping’s city wall couldn’t quite compete. The Queen Mother of the West’s miasma, which could make all the fish in the East Sea go belly up, was powerless against her. Yang Wan’s feet had just left the ground on her sword when the sword snapped. She tumbled to the ground along with her sword—for ten li around Wanshuang, no sword dared to fly.

Even through the reincarnation wood, Xi Ping felt that overbearing sword aura. Comparing it to Zhaoting, which he had with him and which didn’t even give him a headache when it beat him, he couldn’t say who was being insulted by putting the names of the swords of the north and south together.

The richly attired Queen Mother of the West landed miserably and “melted” where she was without making a sound.

When the seven great ascended spirit evil cultivators had besieged Xuanwu in the South Sea, Wangge Luobao had obviously not used his full strength; his depths were unknown. The Emperor of the East had an unorthodox background and the most contemptible tricks. Zhuoming and Yu Chang were both schemers full of guile. The Snow Wolf and Lord Guang’an were two great sword cultivators, one with a soft sword, one with a firm one, equally matched. They were at their strongest directly facing the enemy. But the Queen Mother of the West basically hadn’t attacked. A medicine cultivator only seemed capable of playing an auxiliary role against an enemy. She had always been under the protection of her loyal sword cultivator.

Only now did Xi Ping learn why the Emperor of the East said that Lord Guang’an was her kept little boy toy—facing a powerful foe, the Queen Mother of the West was exceedingly calm. The craftiness of her methods actually exceeded Lord Guang’an’s. The poison miasma blended into the wind, the water…even into the light. It was everywhere, getting in by every opening. Xi Ping’s vision suddenly blurred. He realized with a start that it included a poison that could numb the consciousness.

He quickly put a mind calming pill under his tongue. In just this brief span of time, without him noticing it, the better part of Xi Ping’s protective spiritual energy had dispersed. The wintry wind of Flying Jade Peak chilled him to the marrow. He turned his head and sneezed. He hadn’t sneezed in over a decade; he wasn’t used to it anymore. He accidentally bit his tongue, even bringing tears to his eyes.

It turned out that Wen Fei’s fighting skills weren’t the exception.

And yet the ways of medicine and toolmaking had always been discussed on equal terms in the cultivation world! If this wasn’t a misunderstanding, then the toolmaking cultivators must have been surreptitiously talking themselves up!

The Sword Slave’s protective spiritual energy was quickly being nibbled away in bits and snatched away in chunks. That monster made of stone and iron didn’t move a muscle. She stood calmly amid the pernicious fog. The fog was like the acid in a factory, quickly scouring away her invisible “armor.” As soon as it found a crack, that miasma seemed to come alive and “prick” at her.

Just then, sword aura that made it hard to catch your breath burst from the Sword Slave. Xi Ping didn’t even get a clear look. He only heard a woman give an extremely brief scream.

The churning point of the sword stirred the surrounding fog like a turbine, forcing out a faint human figure inside it. The Sword Slave didn’t even touch the Wanshuang Sword. She reached out and wrung the Queen Mother of the West’s slender neck.

In a daze, Xi Ping seemed to hear the sound of her neck snapping. All he could see was a vague, ornately-dressed, wide-sleeved outline in the fog. Then there was a sound like tearing silk. His heart gave a fierce jump. That woman’s body disintegrated in the Sword Slave’s hand, her precious pearl and jade ornaments shattering all over the ground!

But soon after, he realized that he hadn’t sensed the spiritual energy fluctuation of an ascended spirit’s demise.

Xi Ping threw caution to the wind, taking his life in his hands to go meddle. Avoiding the sword energy, he released his consciousness within a narrow range. The miasma nearly soaked his spirit. He saw some bits of rag bearing sword cuts fall to the ground. It was a substitute that had been torn to pieces by the Sword Slave!

The real Yang Wan’s figure flashed quickly. She was just about to escape under cover of the fog. The Sword Slave gave an angry shout and formed a sword seal with both hands. A gust of sword wind flew from her palms. Her puppet body was extremely heavy, but she was as agile as lightning in motion, even more rapid in her pursuit than the sword wind.

Yang Wan was entirely enveloped in a heinous murderous will. At last, she was out of tricks. Panic appeared on her face. The Sword Slave was just about to disappear from the reincarnation wood amulet’s field of vision. As Xi Ping coughed, he rapidly sought his next vantage point…

Just then, the Sword Slave’s enormous body suddenly went rigid. The blow she had aimed at Yang Wan went astray!

Even Yang Wan was stunned.

Xi Ping’s eyes lit up. Without further ado, his consciousness rushed to the reincarnation wood amulet under the Beijue Mountains. Giving no explanation, he simply snatched away Zhou Ying’s consciousness as he was drinking tea with the Blind Wolf King—there was no need to bother with empty formalities with a cultivator of the way of clarity.

“San-ge, cough-cough…lend me your eyes, look at the Sword Slave!”

Zhou Ying saw through the miasma at a glance. The demon eyes gazed upon the Sword Slave’s body. The Sword Slave’s protective spiritual energy was evidently in perfect condition, yet each and every joint made from the shard of a sword was infected with poisonous miasma.

With a thought, Xi Ping used a talisman to weave a big net inside the reincarnation wood, snugly shielding Zhou Ying’s consciousness, blocking the miasma. He felt the poison invading his lungs and coughed so hard he couldn’t catch his breath. Yet there was the excitement of wishing to see the world in chaos in his voice: “She…she’s been infected, hasn’t she?”

The power that had been hidden in the shadows all along, without anyone knowing about it, had struck.

Zhou Ying said, “With something other than what you’re infected with.”

“Obviously, I know that. How did she get infected? Even if Yang Wan had simply torn open her protective spiritual energy and poured in her poison, it still wouldn’t have had this effect.”

In the cultivation world, poison wasn’t a dirty trick. It was a method of doing battle.

If you just put poison into food or drink, no one would be poisoned. It had to be made into a miasma. And making a poisonous miasma was a great test to one’s cultivation. Generally speaking, an ordinary cultivator’s miasma could only take down a cultivator at their own level or below. Those who could poison someone above their grade were all masters. And so-called going “above their grade” only meant taking one small step forward—like a near-established foundation killing an established foundation. In a single step, you couldn’t do the splits right up to the sky.

It was said that Kunlun’s Sword Slave had already wielded Wanshuang in excess of two centuries, even longer than the master of Zhaoting, the new Sword of the South, had been cultivating at all. And the Queen Mother of the West had only become an ascended spirit after Qiu Sha had pierced the sky. Her cultivation level was about the same as Xi Ping’s!

Zhou Ying observed briefly, then slowly said, “The Sword Slave is a half-puppet.”

Xi Ping’s ears were already starting to ring, but after a moment’s blankness, he immediately caught on: the Sword Slave was too terrifying, which had made him forget for a moment that, strictly speaking, she was the same as Xi Yue.

All cultivators starting from the established foundation level had an essence. The higher their cultivation, the thicker their essence.

As an ascended spirit fighting with a cultivator of the same level, after exhausting his essence, he had needed Bai Ling to feed him spiritual stones transferred from all over the country. But shed skins were different. Zhi Xiu didn’t need to take spiritual stones when he went out. He was practically half a spiritual mountain himself. That was why there was so much damage when a shed skin’s essence was exhausted or they passed away.

But the Sword Slave wasn’t a cultivator. She had to eat spiritual stones.

“She’s eaten spiritual stones from the Lancang Mountains!”

The Sword Slave only felt indescribable sluggishness coming from each and every one of her joints. Her spiritual energy actually went out of control. The confused Queen Mother of the West suddenly seemed to hear something. She abruptly turned her head to glance at the Lancang Mountains, dim amid the fog.

In this brief moment, the Sword Slave had already forcibly suppressed the miasma that had contaminated her whole body. She slashed at the Queen Mother of the West. The west wind suddenly changed direction, pushed all the miasma in the sky towards the Sword Slave. The sharp sword only cut off part of the hem of Yang Wan’s skirt—she had escaped!

The Emperor of the East sensed something. Without a word, he vanished, abandoning all his crowd of henchmen where they were.

Wei Chengxiang heard Xi Ping’s hoarse voice: “Poison-repelling pills, take as many as you have, quick!”

No sooner had he spoken than the Queen Mother of the West’s entire hidden realm moved as though it had grown legs, carrying away all the cultivators inside it. An ominous poison mist emerged from the inscriptions on the ground, turning the black-clothed people coveting the hidden realm’s resources into the hidden realm’s resources themselves.

“Bring a drop of blood into the Law Breaker and give it to me.” When Wei Chengxiang had finished getting the blood with a struggle, he pulled the three people’s consciousnesses into the Law Breaker all at once to take shelter temporarily. He didn’t have time to give too many instructions. He hurriedly ran off with that drop of blood to Rosy Cloud Peak—poison-repelling pills that weren’t the right formula could only delay the effects of the poison. To cure it, they would have to rely on Wen Fei.

Zhao Qindan happened to be in the Law Breaker space, helping Tai Sui prepare things for a fresh round of brand removals. She turned her head and saw to her surprise the three people who had dropped in. “A-Xiang, are you… Chang-shixiong? Yao-shixiong?”

At the same time, Zhou Ying’s consciousness was delivered back to the Beijue Mountains in perfect condition by Xi Ping. When he opened his eyes, he saw the Blind Wolf King craning his neck to look at him. “This is my first time seeing an established foundation cultivator who didn’t establish his epilepsy away. Listen, little devil, what’s the matter with you, having a fit just like that?”

Zhou Ying politely pulled back his hand and stood. “Wolf King, there is a letter from Kunlun.”