Chapter 37: Gale Zone

The direction of the hurricane was unpredictable, shifting from left to right, before suddenly appearing beside the twelve members of Cangyang Valley.
“Spread out!” Li Zhen shouted immediately.
The twelve members of Cangyang Valley quickly dispersed to avoid the erratic and powerful hurricane. Although its strength was only at the mid-stage of “Divided Mind,” none of them wanted to waste their vital energy resisting it.
Whoosh!
Yet, the arrival of the hurricane still fell short of expectations. One elder from Cangyang Valley, who was in the early stage of “Combined Form,” was caught off guard and enveloped by a suddenly formed hurricane.
The hurricane spun at high speed, with countless wind blades cutting through the air. The elder had no choice but to create a rotating earth shield around himself to block the wind blades. Soon, the hurricane passed, and the elder remained unharmed, floating in the air.
Li Zhen’s spiritual sense sensed the elder’s condition and realized he hadn’t been hurt, only had some of his vital energy wasted.
“Keep moving forward. Be careful, careful, careful,” Li Zhen’s spiritual voice warned the other eleven members.
The twelve members of Cangyang Valley continued to move through the hurricane-like storm, staying highly focused as they navigated through it.
Whoosh!
Suddenly, after flying through the hurricane zone for three days straight, a loud sound of wind cutting through the air came from ahead. Hundreds of gale winds rushed toward them—sharp as knives and swords, tangible and icy cold.
The twelve members hurriedly moved to avoid these sudden gales, but one elder in the early stage of “Combined Form” was still struck by a blade-like gale.
The elder created an earth wall in front of him to block the gale, then let out a sigh of relief, his eyes filled with concern.
The strength of that gale was already close to the late stage of “Divided Mind.” Considering there were hundreds of such gales, if they all hit one person, it would be fatal.
Li Zhen, Yang Di, and the other twelve members of Cangyang Valley immediately understood the severity of their situation. This was just a marginal area—already filled with so many powerful gales. If they went deeper, they would face them constantly.
“Everyone, we’ve entered the Gale Zone. Based on my past explorations, once a certain direction has a gale, there won’t be any more gales within hundreds of miles ahead. But now, with the emergence of the Eight Directions Sword stirring up cosmic energy, this pattern might deviate. Be extra careful,” Yang Di reiterated his findings once more.

As the storm zone had shrunk and the “nine shallow, one deep” pattern of hurricanes was also somewhat off, Yang Di couldn’t be certain either, so he could only remind everyone to rely on their own judgment. Soon, the twelve members of Cangyang Valley rushed back into the Gale Zone. Inside the Gale Zone, only tangible gales ravaged the air—seemingly arising from nowhere, endless and extremely powerful. On the ground, there were no snowflakes left, only various ice crystals shaped by the gales, each a sharply defined ice sculpture covering every surface. Whoosh! A gust of wind containing about ten gales suddenly flew toward them. Li Heng swiftly dodged by drifting sideways, then immediately flew in the direction from which the gust had come. After a gust passed, no more gales would appear within a hundred miles in that direction. Li Heng remembered this clearly, so after dodging the gust, he immediately flew along its path and continued moving forward at high speed. Eighty miles later, another gust of wind struck from the side like a fierce monster. Li Heng dodged it quickly again and returned to his previous position. This time, it was difficult to follow the path of the previous gust, as it was on his side. If he went that way, he would have to fly an extra distance if he wanted to head toward the South Pole. Thus, Li Heng could only keep flying straight ahead toward the South Pole. The other eleven members of Cangyang Valley also flew through the Gale Zone in the same way as Li Heng. Whenever gales came from the south, after dodging them, they would immediately fly along the path the gales had taken and then continue forward. If gales appeared on the side or behind them, they could only dodge while continuing to fly south, staying alert for any new gales. … Inside the Dimensional Sphere, Qu Yi didn’t need to distract himself observing the actions of those in Cangyang Valley—such surveillance could be handled by the Artifact Gods. The Furnace of Flame stood upright on the lawn. Qu Yi allocated six parts of his spiritual energy: five parts to scan the array, and one part to melt and refine the crafting materials, familiarizing himself with their properties. Bang! Bang! Inside the Furnace of Flame, the Samadhi Flame suddenly went out, and a silver-colored metal block flew out. Qu Yi used his true energy to envelop the metal block. For now, he was only getting to know some basic crafting materials, and the Furnace of Flame was sufficient. He didn’t need to use the Azure Flame, as it would burn the materials instantly; the Samadhi Flame was enough.

“Silver Wave Stone—I’m already familiar with it,” Qu Yi said with a smile, his eyes fixed on the metal block inside the true energy sphere.
Five bright yellow lounge chairs had been placed by the lake. The infant-like Artifact God was hiding on one of them. Hearing Qu Yi’s words, it closed its eyes and replied, “Not bad. Keep melting the Silver Wave Stone.”
It turned out that the Artifact God, while hiding on the chair, was not only monitoring the activities of people in Cangyang Valley but also keeping an eye on Qu Yi, ensuring he had no rest and had to continuously melt the materials for refining.
“Artifact God, you’re just a pervert. You enjoy torturing me, right?” Although Qu Yi knew the Artifact God was doing this for his own good, he still couldn’t stand it and cursed before taking out another slightly damp silver stone to melt with true fire to understand its properties.
“Flattery, flattery,” the Artifact God replied cheerfully, moving on the lounge chair and swaying it back and forth.
Qu Yi could only glare at it disdainfully before throwing another piece of Silver Wave Stone into the flaming cauldron, instantly igniting the Samadhi True Fire.
“Oh, by the way, Artifact God—have you told the people of the other nine factions about the patterns Yang Di discovered in the Gale Region?” As soon as the true fire was ignited, Qu Yi seemed to remember something and asked right away.
The Artifact God instantly stood up from the chair, roaring, “Just focus on melting the materials! Why distract yourself? With your attitude toward learning refinement, I wish I could pierce through your essence right now and destroy you outright.”
Clearly, the Artifact God, who had extremely high standards for refinement, was very displeased to find that Qu Yi could still be distracted by other things while getting to know the materials. Of course, it had already told the nine spies from the other nine sects about the patterns Yang Di had discovered in the Gale Region.
Qu Yi shuddered at the thought of the pain his essence would suffer if the Artifact God pierced it—he definitely didn’t want to experience that again. He quickly stopped distracting himself.
Bai Man had been sitting beside Qu Yi all along, observing his every move. Seeing his fearful expression now, she couldn’t help but giggle, finding it very amusing.
The two beasts from the Heavenly Punishment Mountains— the Golden Qilin and the Illusory Dancing Butterfly—had borrowed Qu Yi’s Cloud-Stepping Boat and were now boating on the lake, chatting and laughing.
As for Wu Yuan, he was acting nervously, rolling around on the lawn, jumping to see how far he could go, and testing the hardness of his dragon head with a hammer. No one could guess what Wu Yuan was thinking.
…
It had been four months since the twelve people from Cangyang Valley arrived on the Ice Continent.

A violent gale took three months to fully pass through. Now, the twelve people had only spent a month and were still flying at the edge of the Gale Zone. Of course, the members of the other nine sects were in a similar situation, each flying through the Gale Zone with fear in their hearts. At that moment, the twelve people from Cangyang Valley suddenly noticed that the gales approaching them were not only more numerous but also came from various directions. Strong gales were everywhere, all with a power level close to the late Divination stage. This made everyone in Cangyang Valley frown, as they didn’t know which direction to take to avoid them. Bang! Five sword-shaped gales struck Li Heng. Sensing the active gales around him, he didn’t try to avoid them and instead quickly drew out his Peaceful Sky Axe, slashing downward. An earth wall infused with wind energy immediately appeared, blocking the five gales. The other eleven did the same—when they realized the surroundings were filled with gales, they had no choice but to use their magical artifacts to scatter the incoming gales. “Everyone, be careful! This place is strange. When I came here before, there weren’t such chaotic gales. I think there must be something odd about this area—be extremely vigilant,” Yang Di said with suspicion. Li Zhen, Li Heng, and the other eleven grew even more anxious upon hearing this. They slowed down significantly, constantly watching their surroundings. Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Another wave of endless gales came from all directions, targeting the twelve people from Cangyang Valley. With no other choice, they once again used their magical artifacts to cast powerful spells and scatter the incoming gales. Just as their mood improved slightly, suddenly, the entire area was filled with the sounds of beasts. Buzz! Buzz! It seemed like the entire world was filled with these sounds—groups of monstrous beasts, numbering in the tens of thousands, all at the early Divination stage. Tens of thousands of beasts at the early Divination stage represented an extremely powerful force. Even the ten major sects in the cultivation world would find it difficult to gather tens of thousands of experts at that stage all at once. The twelve people from Cangyang Valley felt their throats dry and their hearts rise with anxiety. Soon, countless beasts that seemed made of ice crawled out of the underground ice layers and flew into the air. “Flying Ice Bees!” Li Zhen cried in horror.