Yang Kai gazed into the void ahead. The jade slip Ti Zheng had given him pointed to this very location, and Old Bai had confirmed that the Landlady had vanished right here. That meant the entrance to the Shadowless Heavenly Paradise lay somewhere in this area. As long as he could find the entrance, he could enter and rescue her.
It sounded simple enough, but actually pulling it off was another matter entirely. The first obstacle was locating that entrance.
The Shadowless Heavenly Paradise had remained hidden here for countless ages without ever being discovered, which meant the entrance had to be extraordinarily well concealed. After all, plenty of Open Heaven Realm cultivators passed through Broken Heaven. If the entrance were easy to find, the Shadowless Heavenly Paradise would have been exposed long ago.
Yet the truth was that this small universe had always remained an enigma.
Only its mastermind knew how to open the entrance, how to lure the Landlady here, and how to trap her within.
The void was silent, but anyone could sense the killing intent lurking beneath the calm.
Zhu Jiuyin said with a grave expression, "Kid, I have a bad feeling about this." The moment they arrived, she had felt the sensation of countless eyes watching her. When she sent her spiritual sense sweeping outward, she could clearly detect the auras of numerous living beings hidden among the broken Spirit Lands surrounding them.
Yang Kai said softly, "I'll have to trouble you to stand guard for me!"
Zhu Jiuyin turned to look at him and saw that he had already closed his eyes. Space Laws rippled gently around his body as he began searching for the entrance to the Shadowless Heavenly Paradise.
"Putting me to work again," Zhu Jiuyin snorted coldly, her expression displeased. Still, she didn't dare let her attention waver for even a moment, and her awareness of her surroundings grew even sharper. At the same time, she quietly resolved that if things went south, she would grab Yang Kai and bolt immediately. Fighting in a trap someone else had laid was far too disadvantageous. She wasn't stupid enough to do something like that. Her only obligation on this trip was to keep Yang Kai safe — everyone else's survival was none of her concern.
The Space Laws fluctuated as Yang Kai's spiritual sense probed restlessly in every direction.
A small universe was essentially a self-contained world nestled within the larger space. If an entrance truly existed, there would inevitably be spatial fluctuations at the point of connection between the two.
Back when the Blood Demon Heavenly Paradise had opened, Yang Kai had used his command of Space Laws to sense things in advance, which was how he had managed to seize so many entrance points.
The same principle applied to the entrance of the Shadowless Heavenly Paradise.
Though Yang Kai's cultivation was only at the half-step Open Heaven Realm — the lowest among everyone on this trip — in matters like these, even Zhu Jiuyin couldn't compare to him. Zhu Jiuyin was certainly powerful, but she had zero attainment in the Space Laws. The entrance to the Shadowless Heavenly Paradise was hidden with extreme subtlety; it might release only the faintest wisp of spatial fluctuation, something she would never detect, but Yang Kai had a good chance of picking it up.
And once he found the entrance's location, they could figure out how to get inside.
He submerged his consciousness, letting nothing else enter his mind. With meticulous care, he felt out every inch of the surrounding void, discerning the subtlest of differences. His entire being grew ethereal, almost transcendent.
"Get out here!" Zhu Jiuyin suddenly roared, whipping her head toward a broken Spirit Land and raising her delicate hand.
Without a sound, that fragment of Spirit Land — a hundred li across — exploded into pieces. Amid the flying rubble, several figures stumbled into view in a sorry state, their faces stricken with alarm.
But before Zhu Jiuyin could strike at them again, a hearty laugh rang out: "Senior Sister Zhu, what a temper you have. A woman with too much temper won't age well, you know!"
As the words fell, a figure wreathed in dense demonic qi revealed itself on a Spirit Land off to one side — none other than Ti Zheng, who had appeared in Broken Heaven earlier.
He was not alone. Two other figures materialized beside him, their bodies shrouded in rolling mist that obscured their features and forms.
Yet both radiated the unmistakable aura of peak-grade Open Heaven cultivators.
Swish, swish, swish…
All around them, figures stepped into view atop the various broken Spirit Lands. Yue He and the others looked around, and a chill crept into their hearts. In this deep reaches of Broken Heaven, in this seemingly insignificant stretch of void, more than twenty Open Heaven Realm cultivators had gathered. Apart from Ti Zheng and the other two peak-grade cultivators, every last one was mid-grade Open Heaven, with the weakest among them at the fourth rank.
Such a lineup was nothing short of terrifying. Across all three thousand worlds, only a great Heavenly Paradise or Blessed Land could muster a force like this.
And judging by how things stood now, Qu Huachang's earlier speculation had been right. The Shadowless Heavenly Paradise's side had indeed arranged for three peak-grade Open Heaven cultivators to work together. Without that, they wouldn't have been able to deal with Zhu Jiuyin. And as long as these three could keep her pinned down, the rest would be more than Yue He's group could handle.
The disparity in numbers was simply too vast.
"In terms of age, I could be your grandmother. What's wrong with having a bit of a temper?" Zhu Jiuyin snorted, her tongue just as sharp as ever.
Ti Zheng offered a mild smile. "I hope Senior Sister Zhu's skill is as formidable as her temper."
One of the figures beside Ti Zheng suddenly spoke up: "Girl Qu — what are you doing here? Don't forget who you are." The speaker clearly recognized Qu Huachang.