Chapter 28: You Can’t Catch Me

On the Spirit Medicine Peak, there were all sorts of rare and precious herbs—fragrant fruits and lingzhi mushrooms—truly a vast treasure trove.
Qu Yi’s spiritual sense sensed the entire peak, which was thousands of meters long and fifty thousand meters wide, with lush spiritual herbs and precious trees everywhere. Naturally, Qu Yi wanted to take the whole mountain away.
“Tool God, do you have any way? Can the Tiny Realm Sphere move this Spirit Medicine Peak?” Qu Yi asked cautiously.
Although he wanted to take the entire mountain, he was afraid that asking in the wrong way might cause the Tool God to pierce his soul again, which would be extremely painful. So he spoke in a gentle tone, asking carefully.
“You really think I’m omnipotent. If I weren’t confined within this Tiny Realm Sphere, moving this mountain would be easy, but right now I don’t have that ability,” the Tool God sighed inwardly.
Qu Yi felt disappointed, his eyes darting around.
“However…” The Tool God’s tone changed.
Qu Yi immediately exclaimed in joy, “Tool God, you have a way to take the Spirit Medicine Peak! Tell me, quickly!”
But after a moment of silence, the Tool God said softly, “Qu Yi, you fool, lazybones—why don’t you use your brain? Fine, out of pity for you, I won’t pierce your soul this time. Don’t you know the capabilities of the Tiny Realm Sphere?”
Qu Yi immediately became disheartened. The Tool God was deliberately teasing him. When he asked about the sphere’s abilities, the Tool God had hidden them from him, so how could he know?
Seeing Qu Yi quiet down, the Tool God couldn’t help but say, “Alright, I’ll tell you. Just like I collect spirit stones and ores and store them somewhere, these herbs can also be collected and stored elsewhere. Now, I’ll go collect those herbs, and then you go get the Nine Yang Spirit Gathering Locking Array.”
Qu Yi immediately cried out, “Tool God, I don’t understand the Nine Yang…”
Before he could finish speaking, he felt that the Tool God had already told him how to break the Nine Yang Spirit Gathering Locking Array.
Entering the array from the outside meant facing its attacks, while inside were the various array nodes. As long as the devices at those nodes were removed, the array would be destroyed.
The Tiny Realm Sphere floated out and quickly moved across the entire Spirit Medicine Peak. Pieces of land were lifted up and immediately absorbed by the sphere. Qu Yi also got busy, flying around to remove all the devices of the Nine Yang Spirit Gathering Locking Array.

The entire Lingyao Peak had completely changed by now—there wasn’t a single blade of grass on it, only dark soil. The dense spiritual energy in the air had thinned out significantly due to the removal of the Jiuyang Juling Suofeng Formation.

At this moment, Qu Yi, Qing Wugui, Bai Man, and Wu Yuan entered the Cunjie Ball together.

“Qu Yi, hand over all the components of the Jiuyang Juling Suofeng Formation to me. I need to re-establish it in the Lingyao Space to ensure there’s enough spiritual energy for the herbs to grow,” came the voice of the Artifact God.

Hearing this, Qu Yi understood immediately—since the place where the herbs were stored had the same level of spiritual energy as the outside world, a spirit-gathering formation was necessary for them to grow healthily.

“Okay!” Qu Yi promptly handed over all the components.

Then, the Gold-Eating Rat rushed out, snatching one of the components at a time, disappearing after each grab, before returning to take another until all the components were gone.

Qu Yi was puzzled—couldn’t the Artifact God use his own infant body to take the components? What secret lay hidden in the Artifact God’s body? Full of doubts, he couldn’t figure out the mystery of that infant body.

…

On Huoqing Peak, the marine monsters that had gone to various peaks of the Huoyue Sect were gradually returning.

In the eyes of the Thunder-Ice Crocodile, lightning flashed rapidly, and his entire body emitted the icy chill of frozen space.

It turned out that out of the 200 marine monsters tasked with eliminating the lower-level disciples of the Huoyue Sect, less than 100 had returned. This clearly meant that the other hundred or so had died.

The Thunder-Ice Crocodile stared at Linghuo Shangren, waiting for an explanation.

Linghuo Shangren also sensed the low number of marine monsters and knew that the Thunder-Ice Crocodile wanted him to explain whether the Huoyue Sect was hiding some experts, which had led to such heavy casualties among the marine monsters.

“Brother Leibing, the deaths of those marine monsters were definitely not caused by the disciples of the Huoyue Sect. All the cultivators at the Golden Core stage and above are here on Huoqing Peak,” Linghuo Shangren said, lowering his stance to explain earnestly in order to cooperate with the Thunder-Ice Crocodile in capturing Qu Yi.

The Thunder-Ice Crocodile then communicated with the returning marine monsters via their spiritual senses and learned that indeed all the lower-level disciples of the Huoyue Sect had been killed. The deaths of those marine monsters were likely the result of an ambush by some rogue cultivator.

“Yongshan, Chengchang, Qiuyu—tell me, are there any powerful rogue cultivators on Cuimu Planet?” The Thunder-Ice Crocodile immediately asked the three sect leaders.

Naturally, the three sect leaders knew best about the situation on Emerald Jupiter.
“No, there are absolutely no independent cultivators on Emerald Jupiter,” the three sect leaders replied firmly.
With the resources on Emerald Jupiter, it wasn’t even enough to sustain the four major cultivation sects, let alone provide space for independent cultivators to survive.
Thunder Ice Crocodile pressured the three sect leaders with his primordial spirit. Seeing that they still gave such firm answers under such immense pressure, he was certain that it wasn’t some independent cultivator who had attacked those marine monsters.
Linghuo Shangren was thinking quietly when suddenly his eyes lit up, and he immediately said, “Brother Leibing, may I ask those returned monsters which peaks in the Lan Yue Mountains they went to?”
Thunder Ice Crocodile looked at Linghuo Shangren hesitantly, not understanding the meaning behind his request, but still asked the returned monsters to answer.
“Shanghuo Peak!”
“Jiyun Peak!”
“Lantian Peak!”
……
The returned marine monsters immediately informed Linghuo Shangren.
Linghuo Shangren remained calm, then suddenly smiled. His body left Fire Clear Peak and teleported away.
At that moment, Thunder Ice Crocodile, Xuan Gu Shangren, and Lingji Shangren all realized that by asking this question, Linghuo Shangren was implying that the murderer was likely on one of the other peaks. Given his familiarity with the Lan Yue Mountains and the layout of these peaks, he could surely deduce the murderer’s path.
Most importantly, Thunder Ice Crocodile, Xuan Gu Shangren, and Lingji Shangren all had an intuition that the murderer was likely Qu Yi—otherwise, Linghuo Shangren wouldn’t have had that strange smile before teleporting.
“Chase after him!”
The three of them thought of it almost at the same time and immediately teleported away, using their spiritual senses to track Linghuo Shangren’s presence and closely follow him.
……
Qu Yi flew alone in the air, continuing eastward, getting farther and farther away from Fire Clear Wind.
He had originally planned to attack the marine monsters but found that they had all disappeared. Qu Yi realized that after eliminating the disciples of Fire Moon Sect, those marine monsters had returned to Fire Clear Peak.
Now, with no marine monsters around and unwilling to take risks at Fire Clear Peak, Qu Yi decided to search for Fire Moon Sect’s mineral areas, hoping to seize some ores in the process.
“Qu Yi, it’s bad—Linghuo Shangren is flying toward you,” the voice of the Artifact God rang out again in time.
With his early stage of exiting the body, his speed was indeed fast—traveling a thousand miles in just a breath. In just a few breaths, Linghuo Shangren would arrive.

Qu Yi wasn’t too panicked either, but he already had a Space Passage Talisman in his hand—something he had obtained from Qing Wu Gui. To keep the secret of the Tiny Realm Ball hidden, he needed to use this talisman as a cover.

Ling Huo Shangren flew ahead, while Lei Dian Bing E, Xuan Gu Shangren, and Ling Ji Shangren chased after him with all their might. They eventually caught up to Ling Huo Shangren, and the four of them flew side by side.

Of course, at this point, the four of them had also detected Qu Yi’s presence, knowing that he was flying in the air ahead.

“Hmph, this time, I’ll see where you can run,” Ling Huo Shangren thought fiercely. He already held a sphere of true energy in his hand, ready to release it the moment he reached Qu Yi, disrupting the surrounding space and rendering Qu Yi’s Space Passage Talisman ineffective.

Seeing the true energy in Ling Huo Shangren’s hand, Lei Dian Bing E, Xuan Gu Shangren, and Ling Ji Shangren understood his plan. They immediately formed their own spheres of true energy, ready to launch them at any moment.

As long as the space was disrupted, space-based spells like Space Passage Talismans and teleportation couldn’t be used, thus preventing Qu Yi from escaping.

Qu Yi listened to the messages sent by the Artifact God. When Ling Huo Shangren was about a thousand li away, he immediately activated the Space Passage Talisman, and a spatial portal appeared in the air.

“Ling Huo Shangren, you won’t catch me!”

Before entering the spatial portal, Qu Yi shouted triumphantly before flying through it.

Of course, Qu Yi didn’t use the portal to teleport away. Instead, he immediately entered the Tiny Realm Ball, which then turned into dust and fell onto the mountains below.

Ling Huo Shangren’s spiritual consciousness heard Qu Yi’s arrogant shout and became enraged. He spat out a mouthful of blood and rushed to the place where Qu Yi had just left.

The spatial portal created by the Space Passage Talisman was slowly disappearing.

“Qu Yi, I will definitely catch you,” Ling Huo Shangren said. He took out his Fire Disc and wildly summoned clouds of fire in the air.

He was furious—after two whole years, even as a beginner at the Outward Departure stage, he still hadn’t managed to capture Qu Yi, who was already at the Golden Core stage. This filled him with rage; if he didn’t vent it, he might explode.

Soon, Lei Dian Bing E, Xuan Gu Shangren, and Ling Ji Shangren arrived as well. Seeing the sea of fire clouds created by Ling Huo Shangren, they realized that he had let Qu Yi escape once again.

“Lei Bing, can we execute the plan I suggested right away?” Ling Huo Shangren calmed down and transmitted his voice through his spiritual consciousness.

Elder Linghuo suggested using ocean monsters at the Golden Core stage as bait, so that when Qu Yi went to kill them, they could team up to capture him.
“Good,” said the Thunder Ice Crocodile with a smile, and immediately sent a message back.