Pei Qiqi looked at Nie Tian and pondered in silence for a while before asking, “Do you have some sworn enemy that you’re bound to kill, like Li Langfeng does?
“Why do you ask?” Nie Tian sounded very surprised.
Sympathy could be seen in Pei Qiqi’s eyes as she said, “I have a feeling that you have been intentionally putting yourself in dangerous situations lately. Back when we were in the Blood Skull’s secret stronghold under the creek, I saw you eat those pieces of spirit beast meat. Those pieces of mutant spirit beast meat were filled with large amounts of impurities. No sensible man would absorb flesh power from it.”
She had a feeling that the path of cultivation Nie Tian had chosen was similar to Li Langfeng’s.
In Li Langfeng’s case, he practiced his cultivation by extracting a specific type of toxic energy from the spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth in the Realm of Split Void. However, aside from that type of toxic energy, there were many more types of toxic energy that Li Langfeng wouldn’t be able to refine and detoxify within the spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth in the Realm. As a result, his body was constantly under great pressure.
Therefore, when she had seen Nie Tian consume the meat of fourth grade mutant spirit beasts, she had assumed that Nie Tian wasn’t able to refine and detoxify the numerous types of impurities in the meat.
That was why she believed that Nie Tian would die prematurely, just like Li Langfeng would.
“We’re not the same, me and him.” With a hearty smile on his face, Nie Tian decided not to tell Pei Qiqi that he had the ability to eliminate the impurities from within the toxic spirit beast meat. “…Perhaps we have something in common. Sure, I am in a hurry to improve my strength, but I’ll never do it at the expense of my own life.”
“Oh, really?” Pei Qiqi seemed rather skeptical.
“I need to go to the place you talked about.” Nie Tian insisted.
Pei Qiqi pondered in silence for a long while before she finally nodded and said, “Alright, we’ll go to the Void Illusion Mountain Range together. Now that I’ve entered the Greater Heaven stage, I need to spend some time there to ponder the profound truths of spatial energy, as well as to practice and perfect a few of my secret magics. Other than that, I need to find a suitable location for my teleportation station in the mountain range.
“However, I won’t cross the border into the region where all lives are forbidden with you.”
“Okay, I understand,” Nie Tian said.
“We’ll move out today,” Pei Qiqi said with determined tone.
“Sure.”
…
Later that day, the two of them went to the teleportation portal the Blood Skull had set up in the center of Shatter City. Since they were both guest elders of the Blood Skull, they paid the required amount of spirit stones and teleported to the Blood Skull’s base in the Void Illusion Mountain Range via the portal.
Moments later, the two of them appeared in the Blood Skull’s base in the Void Illusion Mountain Range. Gu Yu, the Blood Skull’s highest commander in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, was taken aback upon seeing them.
“Ms. Pei, Hua Tian, how come you’re back here so soon?” Gu Yu asked with a smile.
The news of Nie Tian creating a major stir and killing numerous Hunters in the hilly area and wasteland had already spread to their base.
Recently, he had also heard of Nie Tian and Shi Nan’s battle in the Blood Fighting Pit two weeks ago.
After witnessing and hearing about the series of incidents regarding Nie Tian, Gu Yu had already begun to attach great importance to him.
“Personal affairs,” Pei Qiqi said with an indifferent tone.
Gu Yu nodded as he realized he had better not pursue the matter. Therefore, he turned to Nie Tian and said, “Umm… Shi Hui came the other day.”
Nie Tian’s eyebrows furrowed. “Shi Hui?!”
“Exactly…” After a brief hesitation, Gu Yu said, “Hua Tian, Shi Hui is also in the Void Illusion Mountain Range right now.
“You’d better be extra careful and try your best to avoid him in the Void Illusion Mountain Range. Brawls and battles are forbidden amongst Blood Skull members in Shatter City, or any other place where the Blood Skull rules.
“But that’s not the case for guest elders of the Blood Skull.
“As for Shatter City, in light of the rules set up by the head, no one dares to fight in Shatter City, no matter who. However, the Void Illusion Mountain Range is out of our jurisdiction. We won’t interfere even if guest elders of the Blood Skull kill each other due to conflicts of interest in the mountain range.”
By saying these words, Gu Yu was practically warning Nie Tian of Shi Hui, and reminding him that if he ran into Shi Hui in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, Shi Hui definitely wouldn’t let him off.
Pei Qiqi’s expression flickered slightly as she exclaimed, “Shi Hui!”
“Thank you for the reminder, Uncle Gu.” Nie Tian expressed his gratitude.
“Just be careful when you go out there.” Gu Yu didn’t want to be too open about the situation.
Shortly thereafter, Pei Qiqi and Nie Tian left the Blood Skull’s base and marched into the Void Illusion Mountain Range.
While the two of them were traveling alone in the vast mountain range, Pei Qiqi turned to Nie Tian and said with a serious expression on her face, “I originally planned to part ways with you once we got to the Void Illusion Mountain Range. However, since Shi Hui is somewhere in the mountain range, I’ll keep you company until you leave the mountain range and head towards Ash City.”
Now that she had entered the Greater Heaven stage, Pei Qiqi was confident that even if she ran into the late Greater Heaven stage Shi Hui in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, she wouldn’t be in danger.
She was aware that Shi Hui enjoyed a high prestige among the Blood Skull’s guest elders. Many of them even served him as his informants.
Pei Qiqi assumed that the news of her and Nie Tian coming to the Void Illusion Mountain Range would soon find its way to Shi Hui.
Just as Gu Yu had reminded Nie Tian, Shi Hui didn’t dare to do anything to him in Shatter City. However, now that they were both in the Void Illusion Mountain Range, the Blood Skull wouldn’t have the right to interfere if he wanted to make a move on Nie Tian.
After all, they were only guest elders of the Blood Skull, and the Blood Skull didn’t have much power over their actions.
“Actually, that won’t be necessary.” Nie Tian took out the mask Dong Baijie had given him as a gift, put it on, and said, “Shi Hui won’t be able to recognize me when I’m wearing this.”
With a slightly surprised expression on her face, Pei Qiqi said, “It’s quite a fine piece of work. I can tell it’s of premium quality, and it must have cost you quite a fortune. However, you should know that Shi Hui is by no means an ordinary person. Even though he doesn’t quite match up to Li Langfeng in terms of battle prowess, he is one of the most hard to deal with people in the Realm of Split Void. If you actually run into him, you won’t necessarily be able to fool him with that mask.
“Furthermore, I doubt that Shi Hui will be the only one looking for you. Li Langfeng and the Fang probably will be after you too once they learn about your actions.
“You’ve made too many enemies in the Void Illusion Mountain Range. The news of your return might soon find its way to their ears. If it comes down to that, I don’t think you’ll be able to fool them all by only relying on this mask.”
After hearing her words, Nie Tian grew somewhat worried.
“Put the mask away for now. You’d better show your real face before we part ways,” Pei Qiqi advised. “Otherwise, if someone else sees us together, they’ll easily deduce your true identity, and your mask will lose its effectiveness. I think it’s better that you put it on when it’s time for us to part ways, and you travel alone to the forbidden region by Ash City.”
“Alright.” Nie Tian took Pei Qiqi’s advice and put the mask away.
After a moment of pondering, Pei Qiqi explained, “Also, escorting you isn’t the primary purpose of my trip. I’m here to find a suitable location to set up my teleportation station. I’ll keep an eye out for such a location as we march onward, since I might just find a suitable location on our way. You never know. ”
As the two of them marched onward, Nie Tian unleashed all seven Heaven Eyes, through which he scanned the vicinity for humans and ferocious mutant spirit beasts.
Whenever he detected exploring Qi warriors in their surroundings, they would make a detour to avoid them; whenever they encountered low-grade mutant spirit beasts, they would attack and slaughter them.
Nie Tian’s seven Heaven Eyes saved them all the unnecessary trouble along their way.
After slaughtering a handful of second-grade and third-grade mutant spirit beasts, the two of them set foot in the Wild Fire’s territory in the Void Illusion Mountain Range.
The Void Illusion Mountain Range covered an extremely vast area, and the Wild Fire’s territory was a realm of bone-piercing coldness. In the icy land that stretched as far as the eye could see, immense glaciers could be seen everywhere.
However, from time to time, torrential flames would spew out of some of the spatial rifts that slithered in the icy wind.
If it were some other part of the Void Illusion Mountain Range, the blazing flames would be a tremendous fire hazard.
However, since the Wild Fire’s territory was covered in ice year-round, the spewing flames normally wouldn’t cause any disastrous results.
As Nie Tian and Pei Qiqi traveled in the icy land, Nie Tian discovered a few Qi warriors dressed in Wild Fire garments via his Heaven Eyes.
However, he didn’t feel the need to inform Pei Qiqi of their presence. Rather, he took the lead and circled around them. Just like that, they marched among the bitter-cold glaciers at a fast speed.
On this day, while the two of them were marching forward, Nie Tian suddenly sensed an unusual movement from the Flame Dragon Armor within his bracelet of holding.
Without the slightest hesitation, he stopped to examine the Flame Dragon Armor with his psychic awareness, and immediately received a vague message from the Flame Dragon Armor.
Surprisingly, the strand of will from the Flame Dragon Armor seemed to be guiding him to a certain location.
However, the direction of that location deviated greatly from the directions Pei Qiqi had given, which made Nie Tian somewhat hesitant.
Just as he was about to ignore the message, another more urgent strand of will came across to his mind.
After pondering in silence for a while, he turned to Pei Qiqi and said, “How about we take a look over there?” With these words, he pointed in the direction given by the Flame Dragon Armor.
Baffled, Pei Qiqi asked, “What? Do you sense something?”
Nie Tian nodded.
“Alright,” Pei Qiqi agreed. Immediately afterward, she seemed to have realized something, and thus turned to Nie Tian and asked, “Do you have a method of detecting signs of life in your vicinity? We’ve been marching for some time now, but other than a handful of low-grade spirit beasts, we haven’t encountered any human cultivators. It’s a little bit strange.”
As a matter of fact, she had long since suspected that Nie Tian had something to do with this.
Previously, when the two of them had run away from the injured Li Langfeng, their escape had been surprisingly smooth.
Back then, since the both of them had been in poor condition, they had desperately needed to avoid enemies on their path of escape, and coincidentally enough, they hadn’t run into anyone along their way.
It was precisely because of this that no one had seen them, and thus Li Langfeng hadn’t been able to pry their whereabouts out of anyone.
That alone had been strange enough.
Later, rumor had it that Nie Tian had possessed numerous pursuing Hunters in the palm of his hand in the hilly area and wasteland. The Fang had even been forced to invite Xiao Lin to their cause.
She had long since heard stories about Xiao Lin, and learned that he had been an expert in tracking skills and magics.
The fact that Xiao Lin had joined the pursuit against him and he had met with the Blood Skull’s rescuing team anyways was enough evidence to Nie Tian’s prominence.
As for this time, the two of them had been traveling for about ten days already, yet they hadn’t come across anyone. Connecting all the dots together, she began to see a pattern.
“Yeah.” Nie Tian didn’t intend to hide the truth any further. “I’ve mastered a special magic which allows me to detect even the most trivial fluctuations of life energy within a large area around me. Not only that, but I can also tell whether the fluctuations are from humans or spirit beasts, as well as their rough cultivation bases and grades.”
Upon hearing Nie Tian’s words, Pei Qiqi’s crystal-clear eyes shone with the light of excitement. “No wonder you dared to return to Shatter City alone. If I had known you had such a divine skill, I wouldn’t have worried about your safety.”
Knowing that Nie Tian possessed multiple secret magics, Pei Qiqi felt increasingly relieved as she led the way for Nie Tian.
After marching a short while in the direction given by the Flame Dragon Armor, Nie Tian discovered an area filled with active spatial rifts via his Heaven Eyes.
Not only that, but he also saw an acquaintance — Shi Hui.
“I detect Shi Hui! It seems that he and some people from the Wild Fire are getting along pretty well!”