Although the old man's Nascent Soul had not been captured this time, his physical body had already been destroyed. Without several decades of recovery, there would be no restoring his vital energy.
Moreover, once he returned, he would have no choice but to seize a new body, but finding a suitable vessel was far from easy. Whether he could locate one in time was entirely uncertain.
If desperation forced him to settle for some random body, a drastic drop in his cultivation would be virtually guaranteed.
On the other hand, Han Li had obtained two ancient treasures out of nowhere along with the storage bag the old man had left behind — quite the haul. Even if he found nothing of value in that Cangkun Shangren's cave dwelling, this trip to the Mulan Prairie would not have been in vain.
With that thought, he glanced toward the spot where the old man's body had dissipated into nothingness. A pale silver storage bag floated there.
Han Li's expression remained unchanged as he reached out with an invisible hand through the air. The storage bag flew straight into his grip. Without the slightest hesitation, he sent a sweep of his spiritual sense inside.
The result left Han Li greatly disappointed.
Aside from over a dozen mid-grade spirit stones, the bag contained nothing but ordinary forging materials and a few bottles of pills.
When Han Li opened the bottles for a closer look, the pills inside were all mundane varieties — nothing remarkable at all. It seemed the Mulan Prairie really was starved of cultivation resources. A dignified Nascent Soul stage Dharma Master possessed almost nothing of real value.
Most frustratingly, there was not a single jade slip among the contents — exactly the sort of thing he had been hoping to find. That struck Han Li as peculiar, and he let out a soft sigh.
He had originally hoped to obtain some spell techniques for spirit arts, to study what secrets allowed one to unleash powerful spells in an instant. For now, it seemed that would have to wait.
Tossing the storage bag away casually, Han Li lifted his gaze, his eyes burning with intensity as they locked onto the distant mountain peak.
Though the treasure's former owner — the old man surnamed Mu — had fled with his Nascent Soul, the black mountain peak remained unchanged in size, its surface shimmering with fluctuating spiritual light.
Han Li narrowed his eyes slightly and made a gentle beckoning gesture toward the treasure. Now ownerless, the ancient treasure flickered with radiance, rapidly shrank in size, and shot straight toward Han Li.
By the time it landed in his palm, it had reverted to a miniature mountain no larger than his hand.
Han Li hefted the tiny mountain with idle curiosity — it was not particularly heavy — then turned it over and over in his single hand for a careful inspection. At the base of the black miniature mountain, three small characters were inscribed in faint gold.
"Thousand Layer Peak," Han Li murmured aloud, a look of satisfaction crossing his features.
After stowing the mountain away, he cast another glance at the Wind-Riding Chariot and put it away as well.
He stared for a few moments in the direction the old man's Nascent Soul had vanished, lowered his head in thought for a moment, then changed course and shot off through the air to one side.
Before long, Han Li's figure had vanished entirely from the surrounding sky, leaving not a trace.
…
Three days later, in a region of the Mulan Prairie where several low hills stretched out in a cluster, there was no one in sight among the wild grass that stood taller than a man. Utterly still and quiet.
But before long, a streak of azure light flickered at the horizon, and a beam of azure radiance came hurtling from the distance.
Moments later, the azure light arrived overhead and circled once before the glow contracted, revealing Han Li hovering in the sky above.
He glanced down twice, furrowed his brow, then suddenly flicked his wide sleeve. A finger inside the cuff snapped forward.
Several streaks of azure light shot downward like meteors chasing the moon, converging on one of the hills below.
At roughly twenty to thirty zhang above the hill's surface, the azure light detonated, and a faintly shimmering pale-white barrier materialized out of thin air beneath it. Inside the barrier, four figures stood gazing upward at him, each wearing a faint smile.
It was Marquis Nanlong, the white-robed elder, the old woman, and the dark-skinned man.
"Haha! Fellow Daoist Han, it is a great joy to see you arrive safely!" Marquis Nanlong stroked his long beard and burst into hearty laughter. He waved one hand, and the barrier vanished without a trace.
"Oh? Have the other fellow Daoists not arrived yet?" Han Li replied with a smile, drifting down unhurriedly to land before the four of them.
"The others likely did not escape so easily," the dark-skinned man said, shaking his head with a calm expression. "When we split up and fled in different directions, Fellow Daoist Wang and Fellow Daoist You both had Dharma Masters pursue them. shaking off their pursuers will not have been a simple matter."