Chapter 10: The Seven-Faction Plan
When the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion saw the magical weapon in Qu Yi’s hand, it dared not attack first. It immediately transformed into a two-meter-sized leaf, spinning at high speed before slashing straight at Qu Yi.
Qu Yi merely smiled faintly, lifting his Golden Spear slightly. With a surge of his Golden Energy, thousands of golden threads filled the air, targeting the leaf.
The leaf was merely the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion’s transformed form—not its main attack method. Its most powerful attack was still a soul attack.
Just as the thousands of golden threads wrapped around the leaf, a green light burst from it, and a green mist enveloped Qu Yi’s head. This mist was filled with a corrosive soul energy.
This was the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion’s soul attack spell, “Green Soul Corrosion,” which could gradually dissolve and devour one’s soul essence.
Yet Qu Yi remained unafraid. Ignoring the soul attack, he sent another powerful surge of Golden Energy from his Golden Spear, driving it straight into the center of the leaf.
Injured, the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion stopped transforming and reverted to its original form. However, a blood hole the size of a bowl now appeared in its throat, showing it had suffered severe damage.
Still, the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion stared at Qu Yi in terror. It had tried desperately to seal the blood hole to stop the bleeding but soon realized it was impossible.
“Lion, you’ve been struck by my attack. To think you can still escape—is that naivety?” Qu Yi said as he retracted his Golden Spear into his body.
In sheer fear, the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion let out one final shrill roar, like a demon, before collapsing straight down.
Qu Yi chuckled and quickly flew over to the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion, taking out its Wood-type soul core.
Now, Qu Yi had found all five soul cores from the early stage of the Tribulation Phase. After refining them, his soul could absorb them, allowing him to quickly advance to that stage.
However, Qu Yi didn’t plan to refine all five cores at once. He intended to do so only after scanning 20% of the Four Elements Dao and his own soul realm was about to break through to the early stage of the Tribulation Phase.
Because once his soul realm reached the early stage of the Tribulation Phase, the Three-Nine Heavens Tribulation would descend!
Without complete preparation, Qu Yi wouldn’t rush to advance his soul realm to that stage.
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Not long after Qu Yi obtained the Azure-Eyed Soul Lion’s soul core, he suddenly noticed many powerful beings in the tribulation phase flying in the nearby starry sky. Each of them carried a protective energy shield, emitting colorful light balls that were even brighter than those from distant planets.
On the planet, Qu Yi had already refined five soul cores in the early stage of the tribulation phase and incorporated them into his primordial spirit, slowly absorbing the substances within. At that moment, Qu Yi saw tiny light spheres in the starry sky from the planet and noticed that they were all flying toward the core area of the Heart Soul Star Region. This made him think of something and sense something unusual. “So many powerful beings in the tribulation phase flying to the core area—could there be some formidable soul beasts there? Or perhaps some extremely valuable treasures have emerged?” As these thoughts crossed his mind, Qu Yi felt a surge of eagerness and immediately flew into the sky, heading toward the core area of the Heart Soul Star Region as well. In fact, Qu Yi didn’t realize that the gathering of so many powerful beings in the tribulation phase was actually a trap set by four cultivation sects and three demon cultivation sects, aimed at dealing with him. It turned out that Chu Gao, Zu Xiao, Zhuang Xiao, and Zong Chun had been noticed by the powerful warriors stationed on Broken Soul Star by the ten major sects when they left the Heart Soul Star Region from the inner zone, and were captured one by one by each sect. The ten major sects had placed spies in various dangerous places in the cultivation world to track Qu Yi’s whereabouts. Naturally, they also sent people to this famous dangerous area—the Heart Soul Star Region. Chu Gao, Zu Xiao, Zhuang Xiao, and Zong Chun were unlucky as well. In the past, when cultivators left the Heart Soul Star Region, no one would inquire about them. But now, due to the ten major sects’ pursuit of Qu Yi, many rules had changed. So, as soon as the four returned to Broken Soul Star, they were captured by the elders of the four sects. These four sects were the Taiyuan Sect, Lanyang Palace, Jinyang Sect, and Cangyang Valley. Undoubtedly, after searching their souls, the elders of these four sects learned that Qu Yi had entered the Heart Soul Star Region and was heading to the core area alone. Thus, through their mutual intelligence networks, the ten major sects also learned of Qu Yi’s whereabouts. The three demon cultivation sects, in an attempt to show goodwill toward Qu Yi, decided not to send any of their elders to hunt him in the Heart Soul Star Region. Meanwhile, the four cultivation sects and the three demon cultivation sects joined forces, discussed the situation, and decided to capture Qu Yi together. So, each of the seven sects sent an elder, totaling seven thousand powerful beings in the tribulation phase, who entered the Heart Soul Star Region to search for Qu Yi. However, there were ten thousand planets in the Heart Soul Star Region, and the elders of the seven sects couldn’t find him right away. They came up with a plan: using a mysterious place discovered by the Taiyuan Sect on a planet in the core area as an ambush site to lure Qu Yi in and attack him together.
Before the seven factions jointly ambushed Qu Yi, their elders had to act together, pretending to all go to compete for that mysterious place, so that Qu Yi would feel confident enough to profit from it. Once Qu Yi actually arrived at that mysterious place, the elders would turn from rivals into allies and attack him together.
Unaware of this, Qu Yi continued to fly toward the core area with ease.
……
The Soul Star Region was divided into outer zones, inner zones, and the core area. The core area consisted of ten planets, named Core Planet 1, Core Planet 2, and so on up to Core Planet 10. On these ten core planets, there were powerful soul beasts in the late stage of the Tribulation Phase guarding them, and even ordinary strongmen in the Tribulation Phase dared not approach. This was because those who wanted to obtain strongmen in the late stage of the Tribulation Phase were strongmen in the middle stage of the Tribulation Phase. They needed the soul cores of these late-stage Tribulation strongmen to advance their soul realms to that stage and thus summon the Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulations to achieve such cultivation.
As for strongmen in the late stage of the Tribulation Phase, having already passed through the Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulations and having their soul realms advanced to that stage, they didn’t need to enter the Soul Star Region. They could simply focus on sensing the primordial energy to advance to the Mahayana stage.
Strongmen in the middle stage of the Tribulation Phase were no match for these ten soul beasts in the late stage. Therefore, the ten core planets were generally off-limits to strongmen in the Tribulation Phase.
On Core Planet 5, the entire planet was covered in huge rocks and mountains, with perilous terrain everywhere. Water flowed beneath the rocks and at the base of the mountains, but there were no major water currents on the surface. On Core Planet 5, there was a mysterious place—a giant rock crater that sank directly from the surface, forming an opening about a hundred miles in diameter. Human spiritual awareness couldn’t enter below, as it was completely isolated, so no one knew the depth of this crater.
Recently, countless human cultivators had flown to Core Planet 5 and stayed near this giant rock crater. And these human cultivators were all strongmen in the Tribulation Phase, with varying numbers in the early, middle, and late stages. Moreover, from their attire, it was clear they came from seven different factions.
That’s right—the elders of the Seven Factions: the Taiyuan Gate, Qingyun Sect, Lanyang Palace, Yingtian School, Jinyang Religion, Biyan Peak, and Cangyang Valley—had already arrived at the planned mysterious place. However, the three demonic cultivation sects among the ten major sects had not sent a single elder.
The seventy sects, each with a thousand elders, occupied seven locations around the crater, facing off against each other with overwhelming force, as if ready to engage in a duel.
The thousand-year-old elders of Taiyuan Gate had as their leader a powerful being in the late stage of the Tribulation Crossing phase named Shan Kuo. He appeared gentle but was actually ruthless. At this moment, he smiled as he looked toward where the elders of Jin Yang Sect were.
“Jin Yang Sect, you are the first sect dedicated to cultivating demons. Our Taiyuan Gate is the first sect dedicated to cultivating immortals. Since there are only our immortal cultivation sects and your demon cultivation sects here, let the two of us settle this battle to determine who will claim the treasures beneath this chasm,” Shan Kuo shouted loudly, so that the elders of the seven major sects surrounding the chasm could hear him.
The thousand-year-old elder of Jin Yang Sect was also a strong warrior in the late stage of the Tribulation Crossing phase, named Wei Du. He had a ferocious appearance, as if he had killed countless people throughout his life, exuding a terrifying killing aura.
“Taiyuan Gate, do you want to compete with us? Very well. Then let our two leaders fight first to decide life and death, after which the other elders can fight one by one,” Wei Du said, his voice filled with fierce determination.
At that moment, Bi Gui, the leader of Qingyun Sect, Lie Yuan, the leader of Lanyang Palace, and Shun Yu, the leader of Yingtian Sect, all turned their attention to the other two demon cultivation sects: Biyan Peak and Cangyang Valley.
Chi Bao, the leader of Biyan Peak, and Heng Liang, the leader of Cangyang Valley, also looked back at Bi Gui, Lie Yuan, and Shun Yu.
Although there were internal conflicts between the immortal cultivation sects and the demon cultivation sects, when facing common enemies, their factions remained clearly distinct. Since the paths of immortals and demons were separate, they could only confront each other with weapons.
The atmosphere around the chasm was deadly serious, as if the air itself was turning into killing intent.
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Meanwhile, above this Core Five-Star planet, Qu Yi finally flew through the stars. Upon entering the Core Five-Star planet, Qu Yi spotted the elders of the seven sects. At the same time, the elders of the seven sects sensed Qu Yi’s presence.
The elders of the seven sects, who were about to unleash their magical treasures and engage in a fierce battle, immediately stopped their attacks and sent out their spiritual senses to lock onto Qu Yi.
Realizing he had been discovered, Qu Yi could only smile as he flew down, arriving right above the chasm.
“Hello everyone. I’m Qu Yi. I really didn’t expect my arrival to disturb your decisive battle. I’m truly sorry,” Qu Yi said with a smile.
The elders of the seven sects, seeing that Qu Yi not only didn’t flee but also smiled so calmly while surrounded by them, felt admiration for his courage.
At that moment, the elders of the seven sects, who had previously been like fire and water, suddenly started laughing. They held up their magical treasures and pointed at Qu Yi. Some of them cast spells, disrupting the surrounding space to prevent Qu Yi from teleporting away.
Hundreds of spells were cast simultaneously in the air, indeed creating a violent disturbance of energy. The surrounding space became unstable, as if space cracks might appear at any moment. Under these circumstances, no one could use space teleportation to escape.
Seeing that the surrounding space had been sealed off, the leaders of the seven factions began to laugh at the same time.
“Qu Yi, you’re surrounded!” the leaders of the seven factions shouted almost simultaneously.
At this point, the elders of the seven factions stopped pretending and simply laughed at Qu Yi, looking as if they were ready to attack him.
Qu Yi laughed loudly, then glanced at the elders of the seven factions and said, “Do you really think I can’t see through your performance? Since I’ve come here, I’m not afraid. I definitely have a way to deal with you scum!”
The elders of the seven factions were all furious!