Chapter 31: The Nine-Fire Halberd

The spiritual consciousness of the Weapon God served as the vanguard, while the Five Elements acted as the frontline fighters. Qu Yi and the others slaughtered their way forward.
After killing five cultivators of evil magic in a row, Xuan Gu Shangren refined their bodies, restoring his own physique to the peak state of the late Yuan Ying stage.
By then, Qu Yi and the others had reached a mountain outside Zhonghuo City.
The lord of Zhonghuo City, Tang Dong, had mastered fire-based cultivation techniques and reached the early stage of exiting the body. It was said that during his training in the Hundred Demons Mountain Range, he had used fire spells to kill thousands of cultivators of evil magic, earning him the title “Fire Demon.”
However, Fire Demon Tang Dong hadn’t used his powers in over a hundred years, and no one knew his true strength.
Qu Yi, Qing Wu Gui, Bai Man, and Xuan Gu Shangren stood on the mountain, gazing at Zhonghuo City in the distance and thinking quietly.
Meanwhile, the spiritual consciousness of the Weapon God had already covered the entire city of Zhonghuo, gathering complete information about Tang Dong.
“Qu Yi, Tang Dong is now on the top floor of the city lord’s mansion. His strength has reached the peak of the early stage of exiting the body. As long as you pour all your vital energy into the jade sword, the light emitted will still be enough to kill him,” the Weapon God’s consciousness transmitted to Qu Yi.
Qu Yi smiled, already understanding.
“Xuan Gu, bring out your Jade Turtle Relic and summon the jade turtle. Crush the city walls of Zhonghuo City to provoke Tang Dong,” Qu Yi said immediately with a smile.
“Yes, master,” Xuan Gu Shangren replied right away.
At the same time, Qu Yi ordered Bai Man and the Five Elements to enter the Dimensional Sphere.
Xuan Gu Shangren took out the Jade Turtle Relic and, with the power of his vital energy, summoned a 50-meter-tall giant turtle. The turtle descended from the sky, landed on the city walls, causing them to collapse by thousands of meters. Then, with a single leap, it reached a distance of five miles away, collapsing more of the walls.
The city walls represented Tang Dong’s dignity.
Inside Zhonghuo City, the cultivators of evil magic who were resting there sensed the giant turtle but did not intervene, waiting to see how City Lord Tang Dong would react.
Inside the city lord’s mansion, Tang Dong was awakened by the presence of the giant turtle and immediately understood what had happened, filling with rage.
“Hmph! I, Tang Dong, haven’t used my powers in over a hundred years. Many people have forgotten me. If they dare challenge my authority, then let them die!” With these thoughts, Tang Dong instantly flew out of the city lord’s mansion.
Xuan Gu Shangren had already been placed inside the Dimensional Sphere by Qu Yi. The giant turtle, sustained by vital energy, collapsed and exploded immediately without it.

Qu Yi sensed Tang Dang approaching and immediately used all his speed to flee. With the power of his golden energy techniques, his speed approached that of a cultivator in the middle stage of leaving the body. As soon as Tang Dang landed on the mountain peak, he saw Qu Yi fleeing alone at high speed, which made him even angrier, so he chased after him with all his might. “Bastard, stop right now! I’m going to burn you to ashes!” After chasing for a while, Tang Dang realized he couldn’t keep up with Qu Yi and shouted in frustration. How could Qu Yi stop? He converted all his energy into golden energy and continued to flee at full speed. Suddenly, Qu Yi fell from the sky and landed in a cave inside a stone mountain. He then entered deeper into the cave and immediately set up a spiritual confinement barrier. Of course, his energy was greatly depleted at this point, so he intended to use this time to absorb his Yuan Ying and restore his energy. Seeing Qu Yi enter the cave and set up a barrier that even prevented his spiritual awareness from penetrating, Tang Dang became highly suspicious and dared not enter the cave. After a while, Qu Yi removed the spiritual confinement barrier. Tang Dang sensed Qu Yi’s presence again and was shocked to see that his energy had returned to normal. He realized he was lucky not to have rushed in, otherwise he might have fallen for Qu Yi’s trick. “Bastard, come out! I’ll burn you to death!” Tang Dang shouted angrily. Hearing this, Qu Yi laughed inwardly, knowing that Tang Dang was extremely suspicious and had been deceived by such a simple trick. “Tang Dang, if you have the guts, come in! I’ll kill you!” Qu Yi shouted with laughter. Since he knew Tang Dang was so suspicious, Qu Yi wouldn’t foolishly go out—it would be suicide. It was better to let Tang Dang come in himself or have him bomb the mountain out of anger, which would at least cost him some energy. As expected, Tang Dang didn’t dare enter. His eyes moved frantically, and finally, in a fit of rage, he took out his magical weapon, the Nine Fire Halberd. The Nine Fire Halberd was a mid-tier fire-type magical weapon containing several arrays, the most powerful of which was the “Nine Fires Burn the Sky” array. “Kid, if you don’t come out, I’ll burn this whole mountain down!” Tang Dang snarled. Immediately, he aimed the Nine Fire Halberd at the cave entrance, activated his energy, and unleashed one of the arrays sealed within—the “Blazing Fire Array.” A fire serpent rushed into the cave, heading straight for Qu Yi. Qu Yi laughed loudly, took out the Hidden Dragon Sword, and began digging in the cave, creating a passage toward the mountain top. When the fire serpent flew in, it couldn’t reach Qu Yi’s body. Of course, the extreme heat from the serpent had no effect on Qu Yi at all.

Tang Dang’s spiritual awareness was fixed on Qu Yi. After learning of his actions and realizing that the ‘Flame Array’ was ineffective against him, he immediately withdrew it.
“Hmph, bastard! Since you want to hide in the mountains, I’ll just burn you to ashes,” Tang Dang said coldly.
Then, holding the Nine-Fire Halberd, he activated the ‘Nine-Fire Heaven-Burning’ array within it, targeting the entire stone mountain. Nine flames erupted from the tip of the halberd, each containing immense fire energy, as if gathering all the essence of fire in the world. These flames flew to nine positions at the base of the three mountains, forming a huge circular enclosure.
The flames rapidly expanded, growing thousands of meters high. The entire stone mountain ignited as if doused in oil, burning fiercely. The fire seemed endless, completely surrounding the mountain. Not only could Qu Yi not escape, but not even his spiritual awareness could penetrate through such flames. In the air, Tang Dang continued to channel his vital energy to keep the flames burning, consuming the mountain relentlessly.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
The mountain echoed with the sound of splitting rocks. It shrank rapidly—from a giant mountain over five thousand meters tall to one near a thousand meters, then to a small hill of a hundred meters. Eventually, the mountain was completely destroyed, along with the ground beneath it.
But Qu Yi was gone.
Tang Dang was shocked. He had spent half of his vital energy yet found no sign of Qu Yi. It was strange—nothing had been detected even after the entire mountain was burned to ashes.
“Could this bastard have dug underground?” Tang Dang thought anxiously.
After waiting for a while with no signs of movement, he grew even more frustrated. He sat down on the ground, deciding to restore his vital energy first before searching for Qu Yi.
Sure enough, Tang Dang sat down and closed his eyes to absorb spiritual energy.
About a hundred meters away from where he sat, a charred speck of dust drifted in the wind toward his head. This dust was the result of the Dimension Ball’s transformation.
“Pay with your life!”
Suddenly, Qu Yi emerged from the Dimension Ball, wielding his jade sword and swinging it with all his strength. Vital energy, metal energy, wood energy, water energy, fire energy, and earth energy were all channeled into the sword. It immediately emitted a crescent-shaped beam of light that pierced straight into Tang Dang’s body.

Tang Dang was indeed a strong warrior in the early stages of leaving his body. Sensing Qu Yi’s presence, he reacted swiftly, preventing the stream of light from hitting his head and instead causing it to strike his back. As the stream of light entered Tang Dang’s body, he immediately mobilized all his fire-based vital energy to burn up that energy.

Seeing Tang Dang fighting desperately against the stream of light, Qu Yi quickly brought out five Yuan Ying and restored his full vital energy. Then, he swung his jade sword again.

Another stream of light pierced completely into Tang Dang’s body.

“Ah!”

To resist the first stream of light, Tang Dang had already used up most of the remaining half of his vital energy, so he had no way to withstand the second one. Filled with resentment, Tang Dang suddenly made a decision.

“Yuan Ying emerges!”

With a loud shout, a fiery red Yuan Ying appeared in the air. As soon as it appeared, it shot out a fire sword aimed at Qu Yi.

With his vital energy exhausted, Qu Yi’s body could not withstand this attack. At that moment, the Dimensional Sphere came into action again, bursting out of Qu Yi’s soul and growing to one meter in size to block the fire sword’s attack.

Soon after, Wu Yuan and Xuan Gu also jumped out of the Dimensional Sphere. The former spat out a golden sword, while the latter transformed into a giant turtle, both attacking the Yuan Ying in the air simultaneously.

“No!”

Tang Dang’s Yuan Ying was terrified and frantically dodged the attacks, but it became completely weakened.

Qu Yi seized this opportunity to swallow five more Yuan Ying, fully restoring his vital energy.

In an instant, Qu Yi flew to beside Tang Dang’s Yuan Ying, grabbed it with one hand, and immediately unleashed the Azure Blue True Fire to burn Tang Dang’s soul to death.

“Xuan Gu, go and refine Tang Dang’s body now!” Qu Yi shouted from the air.

Xuan Gu immediately flew to Tang Dang’s physical body, placed his hands on it, and quickly refined it.

“Haha, I’ve regained my strength from the early stages of leaving my body!” Xuan Gu was almost in tears.

However, because Tang Dang’s body had been severely damaged by the stream of light, Xuan Gu couldn’t fully restore his previous level of power.

Qu Yi landed, feeling a hint of shock. Fortunately, he had deliberately fled and provoked Tang Dang, causing him to expend a large amount of vital energy first. Otherwise, the stream of light from the first jade sword might not have been able to harm him. In that case, if he had to escape, he would have had to hide inside the Dimensional Sphere, revealing his secrets regarding the jade sword and the Dimensional Sphere.

He decided to use jade swords less in the future. Qu Yi made up his mind without hesitation.
“Great! Now that Tang Dang is dead, I think it’s necessary to bring Wei Yan over to extend San Ding Men’s influence across the entire Zhonghuo City,” Qu Yi shouted with a loud laugh.
Xuan Gu Shang Ren and Wu Yuan both showed signs of joy on their faces.