Chapter 168 - Taking A Long Journey Alone
A thousand miles to the west of the Mt. Black Clouds, a group of adventurers was hunting demonic beasts within a small mountain. There wasn’t a lot of demonic beasts in the nearby mountain range, but martial artists seldom hunted over here.
In normal times, the nearby adventurers wouldn’t even hunt the low-tier demonic beasts here. When Jiang Yi took control of the Mt. Black Clouds and returned to the college afterward, a few large-scale adventurer groups immediately took control of that mountain range. These smaller adventurer groups had no choice but wander around this area.
“Bang!”
In this group of martial artists which numbered around a dozen, two of them were at the Purple Mansion Realm. Right now, they had just slain a tier-one peak-grade demonic beast with ease. With just a short moment, the demonic beast was slain before it even had the chance to release any demonic arts.
“Harvest the materials!”
The team leader sheathed his longsword and scanned the area gloomily. There were too little demonic beasts in the vicinity. If this carried on, everyone was going to go cold and hungry.
“En?”
When his eyes penetrated the forest, he saw something in the east that made his pupils shrank. He saw a purple shadow that was sprinting towards their direction at speed of the gale, taking only a few blinks of the eye to rush up the small mountain.
“Three—tier-three demonic beast! Everyone, flee!”
Only a tier-three demonic beast was capable of such tremendous speed. The team leader might not have seen one before, but he realized it once he saw it and frantically ran to the other side.
“Ah? Retreat—!”
The members of this adventurer group spent most of their time walking the rope of life and death. All of them had fast reactions and scattered in all directions without any hesitation. They didn’t even bother about the demonic beast corpse on the ground.
“Swish!”
It was a pity that their speed wasn’t fast enough. A streak of purple shadow drew across like lightning and quickly caught up to them.
Everyone was surprised when the tier-three demonic beast didn’t attack any of them. Instead, it flashed to the side with extreme speed and drifted off to the west like a phantom. In just a few blinks of the eye, it vanished into the distant range of mountains.
“A person? A youth! There wasn’t a demonic beast—it was a spirit beast!”
Everyone was so frightened that they were shivering from head to toe. The team leader suddenly exclaimed during the instant when he saw a youth sitting on top of that purple giant wolf. This place was rather close to the Mt. Spirit Beast College; thus, it wasn’t hard to guess that it must be a spirit beast that belongs to a martial expert.
“Huuu…”
Everyone wiped the cold sweat of their faces and started to laugh with a grin; it was just a false alarm. Everyone was still shocked in their hearts. A tier-three demonic beast? Only those vice principals were capable enough to tame them, right? But why did the team leader say that it was a youth?
“Uh, someone actually saw me…”
Naturally, it was Jiang Yi who was the one that was seated on top of the purple giant wolf which was speeding off. He frowned slightly. After he descended the mountain, he had been using the mountainous trails but was still spotted by someone.
His eyes flickered and soon got an idea. He made the demon wolf stop and took out some powder from the Fire Spirit Pearl and scattered onto the demonic wolf, turning its fur color into blue. This was a dye that he asked Qian Wanguan to prepare. His purple giant wolf was too eye-catching and would allow people to expose his tracks.
After dying the demon wolf’s fur blue, Jiang Yi took out a silver devil mask from the Fire Spirit Pearl and wore it. He leaped onto the demon wolf and controlled it to continue towards the west.
The Divine Martial Kingdom’s royal capital was in the northwest direction, but Jiang Yi didn’t head towards there in a straight line. He was prepared to take a detour to the southern Great Xia Kingdom, en route to the Saint Spirit Kingdom and finally turning into the royal capital of the Divine Martial Kingdom.
The army of the Mt. Spirit Beast College was estimated to arrive at the royal capital in about six weeks. This meant that Jiang Yi only had six weeks. If he didn’t have the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf, there wasn’t a need to even take a detour because he might not even make it to the royal capital if he took a straight route.
Precisely because of the Silver Moon Demon Wolf, Jiang Yi took a look at the map of the Divine Martial, the Great Xia, and the Saint Spirit Kingdoms and decided to take this route. The speed of the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf was equivalent to a seventh or eighth stage Soul Travel Realm martial expert. According to Jiang Yi’s estimation, these six weeks should be sufficient.
The college was filled with scouts from the Zhangsun Clan. Once he departed from the college, Zhangsun Wuji would be immediately informed. If Grandma Hun was to pursue him again, he might not even make it before joining the Kingdom War.
It was the reason why he picked such a route. After all, no one would expect him to detour all the way to the Great Xia and the Saint Spirit Kingdoms before entering the Divine Martial Kingdom’s royal capital from the northwest, right?
Of course…
There was an even more important reason to why Jiang Yi wanted to take such a long detour!
He was looking for flames—fearsome flames!
Indicated by Qian Wanguan’s information—in Mt. Fire Cloud, there was this volcano north of the Great Xia Kingdom. There was also a place to the west of the Saint Spirit Kingdom, in the nearby vicinity of the Forest of Sin. There was this Soul-Seizing Valley that was rumored to have this dreadful Flames of Netherworld.
The Fire Spirit Pearl had the ability to absorb flames. Jiang Yi might not be certain if the pearl could absorb the flames from within the volcano or the Flames of the Netherworld from the Soul-Seizing Valley, but Jiang Yi wanted to try.
The Kingdom War was too dangerous. It had so many Soul Travel Realm experts, and with his current strength, he wouldn’t be able to survive.
“Swish!”
The Silver-Moon Demon Wolf was moving at a terrifying speed towards the west. Jiang Yi had specifically picked the smaller roads and had been traversing in within the mountain ranges. On the contrary, he didn’t dare to enter the depths of Mt. Thirty Thousand. It was also the reason why he was heading west, to detour around the Mt. Thirty Thousand and enter the Great Xia Kingdom.
The intense speed brought about a strong gale which made Jiang Yi struggle to open his eyes. There were tears in his eyes, and his nose had been sniveling. He was maintaining an observation in the surroundings, controlling the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf to make a timely change in directions.
After traveling for a whole day, the sky was now completely dark. Jiang Yi stopped in a small mountain.
He kept the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf into the spirit beast talisman and poured some essence force in. Once the demonic beast became a spirit beast, it basically didn’t have a need for food or drinks. The occasional injection of essence force was enough to replenish its energy, and this was also the mystical aspect of the spirit beast talisman.
After examining the area, he made sure there weren’t any formidable demonic beasts or humans. Jiang Yi leaped onto a huge tree and sat cross-legged on the branches of the tree before taking out some meat jerky and clean water to have his meal.
After rushing for an entire day, his entire body was feeling the soreness. The Silver-Moon Demon Wolf was moving in a very steady motion, but without any saddle, Jiang Yi felt like his body was about to fall apart.
Relative to the suffering of the body, what made Jiang Yi felt even more uncomfortable was the mental solitary and restlessness. This was the first time he was taking such a long journey by himself. On this small mountain, there was no one in this wilderness—the sky is in complete darkness, making him feel like he was forsaken by the world.
“When the heaven gives you an important task, you have to suffer from the mental breakdown, exhaustion of the muscles, and starvation of the body. In order to become a true warrior, you have to put in much more effort than anyone else and experience more sufferings!”
When he recalled about the teachings from Jiang Yunhai, Jiang Yi soon settled down and didn’t overthink things. He endured the pain from the entire body and began to cultivate on the tree until he fell asleep during midnight.
The next day, he carried on the rush. Qian Wanguan provided him with a very detailed map which allowed Jiang Yi to easily pick a route from the unique terrains and head towards the Great Xia Kingdom with haste.
Along the way, Jiang Yi was surprised by the peacefulness. There weren’t any martial experts that came to pursue him. He didn’t bother about it either and hurried on with a peace of mind. On the fifth day, he had successfully stepped into the territory of the Great Xia Kingdom.
“Yes, this should be the Clear Moon Lake! Mt. Fire Cloud should be a thousand miles west of the Clear Moon Lake!”
Jiang Yi rode on the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf and was standing on top of a small mountain peak while looking at the distant giant lake. He wanted to go to the lake for a good bath, but he was afraid someone might find his whereabouts. He resisted the temptation and steered the Silver-Moon Demon Wolf towards the west.
Under the silver devil mask was a pair of fatigued eyes. One hour later—when he saw the fiery red mountains in the distance, his eyes immediately lit up. He took out the Fire Spirit Pearl and gently dusted it while murmuring, “Fire Spirit Pearl, don’t disappoint me. Absorb all the Earth Fire on this volcano for this Young Master!”