Within the killing formation on Black Wind Mountain.
Just as the black-robed man’s large hand, wreathed in thick blood-killing qi, was about to touch Su Ming’s back, right at the heart—
The Su Ming who had been “frantically fleeing” suddenly stopped in his tracks.
He spun around. The face that had been painted with terror and despair was now as calm as an unfathomably deep, icy pool. His clear eyes had shed all trace of panic, replaced by the cold, indifferent gaze of a hunter watching his prey step into the trap.
“Rise!”
A single word slipped from Su Ming’s lips.
The sound was not loud, yet it carried the weight of a divine decree from the heavens above.
*Boom—!*
It was as if the entire world had been overturned in that instant!
The black-robed man felt the earth beneath his feet tremble violently. The surrounding scenery blurred and twisted like ink dissolving in water.
A thick, impenetrable white mist rose from nowhere, instantly engulfing a space of a hundred zhang in all directions. Within the blinding fog, all sense of direction vanished. When he extended his divine sense, it sank like a stone into the sea, broken down and devoured layer by layer by an extremely resilient yet irresistible force.
“A formation?!” The black-robed man’s laughter abruptly cut off, replaced by shock and fury. “You’re not at Qi Refining?!”
This was absolutely not a formation that a Qi Refining cultivator could set up! The sheer scale and purity of the spiritual energy fluctuations clearly indicated—
“Foundation Establishment! You actually dared to conceal your strength and ambush me!”
The black-robed man finally understood. A wave of humiliation from being toyed with surged to his head. With a furious roar, the vast spiritual energy of his early Foundation Establishment cultivation exploded outward, transforming into black blood-colored streamers that madly lashed at the surrounding mist, trying to tear open this accursed prison with brute force.
But just then, another change occurred!
Above the spreading mist, the obscured night sky seemed to split open as if ripped by an invisible hand. Seven streams of cold, pure starlight, like seven judgment swords descending from the heavens, pierced through the fog and struck the black-robed man with pinpoint accuracy.
*Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle—*
The blood-killing streamers, strong enough to shatter stone, hissed and melted like snow under boiling water upon contact with the starlight, their power diminished by more than thirty percent in an instant! The starlight poured down, each ray carrying the heavenly might to cleanse evil, crushing and shattering the churning blood-killing qi around the black-robed man. He could even faintly hear the agonized screams of the resentful spirits trapped within the killing aura!
The black-robed man felt as if he had been thrown into a boiling cauldron of oil. His protective blood-killing qi writhed violently under the starlight’s glare, and a burning pain and oppressive force, originating from the depths of his soul, nearly drove him mad.
“The Minor Heavenly Cycle Star Formation?! No... not quite, just a prototype!” The black-robed man was both shocked and enraged. He finally recognized the source of this power. “Who the hell are you?! Which peak of the Cloud Hidden Sect are you from, to dare meddle in the affairs of ‘Ming’?!”
His answer came not in words.
But in a single drop of water.
A crystalline drop, the size of a dragon’s eye, containing spiritual energy compressed to its extreme limit, silently pierced through the mist and shot toward his back at a speed almost impossible to track.
“Dripping Water Force!”
The black-robed man was, after all, at the peak of Foundation Establishment and possessed extensive combat experience. The moment the water droplet touched his body, he twisted his torso violently, while a shield formed from blood-killing qi instantly appeared before him.
*Puff!*
A faint, muffled sound.
The seemingly indestructible blood-killing shield, upon contact with the water droplet, was punctured clean through at its center like a piece of paper burned by a red-hot iron, leaving a smooth hole.
The droplet’s power was mostly dissipated, but the remaining force still grazed the black-robed man’s ribs, drawing a spray of blood.
A sharp pain shot through him, and the black-robed man grunted. The disdain in his eyes vanished completely, replaced by unprecedented gravity.
He knew that today, he had bitten off more than he could chew.
“Get the hell out here!” the black-robed man roared in fury.
He clasped his hands together, and a three-foot blood blade, forged from his essence blood and killing qi, appeared in his grasp. No longer lashing out wildly, he poured all his spiritual energy into the blood blade. The weapon emitted a mournful wail of ghosts, transforming into terrifying, blood-red blade lights that hacked madly through the mist, trying to find the formation master hidden in the shadows.
Su Ming’s form moved through the mist like a specter.
He never clashed head-on with the black-robed man.
He was the master of this formation. The mist was his eyes, the starlight his weapon, and the earth beneath his feet his shield.
He constantly shifted positions, always striking from the dead angles of the black-robed man’s attacks, using the Dripping Water Force to harass from a distance.
He sought not a single killing blow, but steady attrition.
This was a hunt of patience. Su Ming was like the most seasoned hunter, wearing down the tiger’s claws and stamina with the least possible cost.
The battle proceeded in an eerily bizarre rhythm. The black-robed man was like a mad demon, his attacks grand and furious, yet they always struck nothing but empty air. Su Ming’s attacks, silent and unseen, each time landed with precision at the most awkward spot for his opponent.
Fifteen minutes later, the black-robed man’s breathing grew ragged.
Simultaneously controlling hundreds of formation flags to refine corpse puppets had already consumed a tremendous amount of his mental energy. Now, trapped within a starlight formation that suppressed evil aura, facing a slippery same-realm cultivator, his spiritual energy was draining at a rate far beyond his imagination.
And in the midst of this high-intensity clash, Su Ming’s keen perception caught a detail.
Approximately every thirty breaths, the black-robed man’s spiritual energy fluctuations experienced an extremely brief, yet very noticeable, violent drop!
It felt like a runner sprinting at full speed suddenly having his heart skip a beat.
Though the process was extremely brief, almost negligible, Su Ming’s divine sense, as precise as a finely tuned instrument, captured it without fail.
“So that’s it…”
A knowing smile curled at the corner of Su Ming’s mouth.
He understood instantly.
The black-robed man wasn’t just fighting him; he was multitasking! He was using part of his mental strength to forcibly maintain the stability of the hundreds of formation flags being refined deep within the cave!
Those formation flags were like hundreds of crying infants, constantly drawing his spiritual energy and divine sense. If the supply were cut off, those semi-finished evil formation flags would likely collapse from energy imbalance, or even backfire on their master!
This was his greatest weakness!
