The four of them had by now exited the garden and arrived at what appeared to be an ordinary small plaza.
Across the plaza, a grand hall covering several acres of land stood imposingly in silence, not a single sound emanating from within.
"Something's off — my spiritual sense can't penetrate it at all. Could the restrictions here still be active?" Patriarch Lüshi said, a trace of gravity in his expression.
"It's not a restriction. That hall was forged from a special material native to our Holy World — a substance called 'Styx Sand.' It naturally possesses the wondrous property of blocking spiritual sense. It would be stranger if Patriarch Lüshi *could* probe inside," Bao Lian remarked lightly after giving the hall a careful once-over.
"No — there are Moth Insect signatures in there!"
Rather than reassured by Bao Lian's words, Patriarch Lüshi's expression darkened. His nostrils twitched twice, and with a grim look he thrust one hand forward into the void. A short blade wreathed in green qi materialized soundlessly in his grasp.
"Moth Insect signatures! Patriarch Lüshi, are you certain?" Bao Lian's face changed in alarm. She swiftly traced a finger through the air before her, and three pale silver rings flashed into existence.
"Hmph! I cultivate the Hundred Lives Unerring Art. With focused attention, I can distinguish the aura of a person dozens of miles away. This distance is nothing!" Patriarch Lüshi snorted confidently.
Two deafening peals of thunder rang out as two thick arcs of golden lightning sprang forth, then rolled and coiled, transforming into two golden pythons over ten zhang long that shot through the main entrance into the hall.
Instantly, thunder boomed from within, and countless flashes of electrical discharge could be faintly seen erupting throughout the interior.
"Evil-Warding Divine Lightning!" Bao Lian's expression shifted slightly at the startling spectacle of the golden lightning.
Generally speaking, Evil-Warding Divine Lightning should no longer possess much restraining effect against Demon Race Sacred Ancestors of her caliber. But when wielded by a fellow Mahayana powerhouse like
At that moment, several sharp hissing shrieks suddenly pierced through the thunder from inside the hall, followed by a series of thuds. Five dark shapes shot out from within, streaked across the air, and landed in a line on the small plaza, directly facing
"Those fearsome insects — just as I thought!" Patriarch Lüshi's face turned cold upon clearly seeing the true forms of the dark shapes.
The five figures were enormous bugs with humanoid faces and insect bodies, each standing three to four zhang tall. Atop their slender necks sat grotesquely ugly male heads, and their forelimbs gripped what appeared to be crude club-like weapons.
However, while the one standing at the very center — the largest among them — bore light blue carapace, the remaining four were all pitch-black, bearing a strong resemblance to the humanoid insect corpse
The leading blue humanoid insect caught sight of the four of them and its face twisted into a hideous grin. It spoke in human tongue with a raspy cackle:
"Heh heh heh… How wonderful… Outsiders, no less… Another feast of flesh and blood awaits… heh heh heh…"
"Indeed… I've missed the taste of blood and meat… I've forgotten how long it's been since our last meal… heh heh heh…"
The other humanoid insects likewise wore expressions of greedy hunger.
Bao Lian's face darkened. She extended a finger toward the void, and the three silver rings before her blazed with brilliant light, humming resonantly.
"Running into five of them at once — not exactly good fortune, but not the worst outcome either. Brother Xie and I will handle three of them. You two can take the remaining two. That shouldn't be a problem, right?"
"No problem at all. Brother Xie and
Patriarch Lüshi naturally had no objection. He gave the short blade in his hand a slight wave, and a surge of green qi immediately coiled outward into the shape of a flood dragon, lungeing straight at one of the humanoid insects.
The targeted insect showed no fear whatsoever. It opened its mouth and spat forth a column of ashen-white qi.
A thunderous boom!
The two streams of energy collided, instantly spiraling together in a violent vortex and shooting straight upward like two dragons — one green, one grey — locked in a savage struggle, tearing at each other without cease.
Bao Lian's three silver rings flashed and vanished from sight.
An instant later, the air above another insect shimmered, and the three rings materialized in a blur, plummeting downward with crushing force.
The insect below bared its fangs in a savage grin and swung the two crude clubs in its grasp violently skyward. A deafening boom shook the nearby air as two torrents of immense whitish force crashed into the three silver rings like a battering ram.
The rings flickered wildly, their descent momentarily halted by the sheer force.
The blue humanoid insect at the center let out another raspy cackle. It waved the dark club in its own grasp slightly, shifted its hind legs, and its entire body blurred, vanishing into the surrounding void.