Fang Xing let out a cold laugh. “Heh, it took me so much effort to lure you guys out here, yet now you want to escape?” The golden wings flickered behind him, and he was suddenly up in the sky. His speed was many times greater than Servant Qiao’s, allowing him to rise higher and cut the Yin Servant off before he could manage to escape.

　　Activating his Foundation Stage power, Fang Xing began to utilize an Ancient technique of the Hundred and Eight Thousand Swords. An endless number of sword-light feathers were engulfed in black malice and shot forward like a wide net to cover and capture Servant Qiao below.

　　Servant Qiao’s attempt to flee to the air was immediately halted from the attack from above. “I’m going to tear you into a million pieces, little brat!” he yelled out, his own malevolent aura drawing into a barrier as he put all of his strength into defense.

　　“Royal Servant Qiao, this little brat is trying to use underhanded tactics against us! We can’t flee, so let us join forces to kill him once and for all!” Servant An grasped a bluish-green jade in his hand, causing it to emit a ray of light that formed a water-like barrier around him. After hopping onto his cloud, he flew towards Servant Qiao to help fend of Fang Xing’s sword feathers, and once the two of them both poured Qi into that bluish-green jade, the barrier finally had enough power to resist the assault. Even then, however, they were quickly pushed into the bottom of the valley without any chance to escape….

　　“Hehe, Old Peng, how is this blood sacrifice I prepared for you? Two Foundation Stages!” Fang Xing spoke to the Flag of Ten Thousand Spirits with a smirk.

　　A black smoke rose up from the flag, and soon the Peng King’s voice could be heard—albeit slightly dissatisfied. “This is supposed to be the first Foundation Stage sacrifice, yet you found me two Yin Servants? You little brat, you did this on purpose, didn’t you?”

　　“It’s already good enough that you get something ; how can you be so picky? You really think Foundation Stage cultivators are just weeds growing all over the place?” Fang Xing cursed back. The boy and beast actually began to verbally abuse each other while floating in midair, behaving as though the two Yin Servants at the bottom of the valley had already died.

　　Within the snowy valley, when Servant Qiao saw there was no longer any hope for escape, he toughened his resolve and took out a blue wheel for himself and a red wheel for Servant An. “This little bastard is so vicious…. Xiao An’zi, let’s join forces. I don’t believe it’s impossible for us to kill him.” These two items were a supreme-grade spirit tool pair, and after instilling them with an insanely large amount of Qi, both of the wheels suddenly shot up into the sky like two interwoven streams of malice.

　　Fang Xing coldly observed from above. “Heh. One Foundation Stage tier two, and another in just tier one. One with a blue foundation, the other with red….” With a quick sweep of the Book of Revelation, the cultivation levels of the two below were completely known to him. Since he wanted to try out his new battle prowess after forming his foundation, Fang Xing decided not to immediately use the Flag of Ten Thousand Spirits to overwhelm them; instead, he let out a growl and waved the one-legged-man lance downward, swinging his arms in a circular motion to bash the two wheels back down.

　　“He dared to attack our supreme spirit tool directly! This kid is definitely seeking death!” Joy flashed across Servant Qiao’s face as he sent even more Qi into his wheel, causing a red shine to vaguely flicker around his body.

　　Although Servant Qiao was worried about the black flag in Fang Xing’s hand, he wasn’t concerned at all about the one-legged-man lance. There didn’t seem to be any extra Qi fluctuations over the lance, meaning it was likely a rather ordinary weapon. If an ordinary weapon were to go head-to-head against the extremely sharp Yin-Yang Twin Wheels, the difference was so large the normal weapon could be sliced right in half; using the statue lance as Fang Xing was would just be a huge detriment….

　　BANG

　　An extremely loud explosion rocked out as the statue lance landed solidly against the blue wheel. The metallic clanging sound echoed throughout the entire valley, and even the snow caps on the trees were shaken down to the ground. Amidst all this noise, there was also the ever faint crisp melody from a string instrument; the Phoenix-Fear Zither within the statue lance had actually been shaken as well, adding a sense of class and charm to the otherwise extremely violent attack.

　　PAH !

　　Servant Qiao witnessed an unbelievable sight: when the blue wheel and the statue lance collided, the wheel was shattered just like that. That unsightly one-legged-man statue was in fact incredibly durable.

　　Servant An had been focusing intently on controlling the blue wheel, and the backlash of Qi when it shattered was so violent it caused him to spit out a mouthful of blood. Servant Qiao was incredibly shaken by this, but he continued controlling his red wheel and directed it to come at Fang Xing from behind.

　　When Fang Xing sensed a spirit tool attacking from the back, he didn’t even bother evading—his extended golden wings alone were already the greatest defense he had. An ear-piercing screech rose up when the red wheel collided with the golden wing and parts of the wing were destroyed, but it didn’t take long before even more sword feathers reappeared to block off the wheel’s advance, not allowing the wheel to move even a single inch closer.

　　Fang Xing opened his palm and activated Gravitational Force to take hold of the red wheel midair. “Damn eunuch, you can have this back!” he sneered before making a throwing motion. The connection between Servant Qiao and the red wheel was forcibly cut, and the wheel suddenly rocketed back down towards the bottom of the valley.

　　Servant Qiao released a loud shriek. He quickly activated his protective jade, forming a barrier just in time to stop the red wheel from slamming into him directly. Although the barrier held, Servant Qiao still ended up having to take three to four steps back, and his face was pale with blood staining the edges of his lips.

　　“Hehe, Old Peng, now you can go and collect your blood sacrifice!” Now that Fang Xing could clearly estimate the difference in power between him and an ordinary Foundation Stage cultivator, he no longer felt the need to continue attacking. He waved his flag, causing the black cloud that had settled above it to seep out and stretch along the bottom of the valley. As its size grew, a giant Peng Bird as large as a small hill appeared within, alongside a countless number of all kinds of spirit beasts that began to throw themselves at Servant Qiao and Servant An like an army.

　　The Peng King was clad in an incredibly malevolent aura and adorned in feathers like black gold. He looked incredibly intimidating, but the laughter he released while leading the beast army to surround the Yin Servants was incredibly sly.

　　“What is this? We belong to the royal clan of Chu; do you really dare to kill us?”

　　“Is this an Ancient weapon?”

　　Inside the black cloud, the two Yin Servants cried out one after another and used all kinds of spirit tools and spells in a desperate attempt to fend off the surrounding beast army, but the Flag of Ten Thousand Spirits was powerful enough to even fight against the mid-Foundation Stage Ying Shihou—how could these two early-Foundation Stage Yin Servants ever have the power to stand against it? The shine from various spirit tools dimmed and the shrieks of misery grew quieter until everything was silent.

　　The Peng King was quite satisfied by all of this. “Haha, the blood sacrifice of two Foundation Stage cultivators. This should be enough to increase my battle prowess by ten percent….” After he finished taking the sacrifice, he changed back into a black cloud and returned to the flag. Fang Xing, on the other hand, flew down to the ground and headed towards the corpses of the two Yin Servants, who’d already been turned into a set of skeletons. Like taking a casual stroll on a familiar path, he picked up the two Yin Servants’ storage sacks. After studying these two for some time, he went over and picked up the sacks of the eight imperial guards as well. Even something as small as a mosquito still had some meat—these were the basics of how to live one’s life.

　　Just as he was about to turn and leave, Fang Xing suddenly recalled something and returned. He pricked open the center of Servant Qiao’s pants using a Flying Sword and looked down with a great deal of interest, only to disappointedly find the flesh and blood had been sucked clean. There was only a black layer of skin covering some bones, making it unclear whether or not that had still been there. “Did you see that on them just now?” Fang Xing asked the Peng King.

　　After just now enjoying a rather lavish meal of blood sacrifice, the Peng King was disgusted to hear such a question. “Why would I pay attention to that!”

　　“I actually quite wanted to check…. Aiii , I shouldn’t have let you go so early!”

　　This immediately left the Peng King speechless. He grew quiet, not wanting to say another word.

　　Left without any other options, Fang Xing decided he’d have to settle for checking other Yin Servants instead. He flew up into the sky and quickly drew back the eight formation flags before slamming his palm out towards the middle of the surrounding mountainside. A few loud noises rumbled out before ice and snow began to roll down, and soon the snowy valley was half-buried with the corpses of the two Yin Servants and eight imperial guards thoroughly covered beneath.

　　Fang Xing gave a quick glance over his earnings for the day and felt extremely satisfied. “Haha, this was indeed a good haul. Let’s go back!” He’d angered these two Yin Servants and lured them out to this valley not only because of his dislike for the Chu royal family, but also because the two Yin Servants had so casually offered to pay a hundred supreme-quality Spirit Stones. This alone had greatly moved his heart, and he also knew they would definitely have plenty of good items within their storage sacks on top of it. After checking their storage sacks directly, he did indeed find a large number of supreme-quality Spirit Stones, as well as plenty of excellent spirit pellets—definitely a great harvest.

　　In truth, since Servant Qiao and Servant An were servants—or, more bluntly, slaves—of the royal family, they wouldn’t normally have so much wealth. It was only because they were closely serving Princess Chu Ci that they were allowed to keep a large amount of Spirit Stones and items for when it might be necessary to benefit their master.

　　Back at the Scripture Caves, although Servant An had casually taken out a hundred supreme-quality Spirit Stones to buy the Black Ice Orders and formation-countering talismans, it had also been to flaunt his wealth—precisely the reason they’d caught the eye of the habitual bandit, Fang Xing.

　　—

　　Even if the various elixirs and spirit pellets weren’t counted, Fang Xing now had several hundred of these purple-shining Spirit Stones. After returning to Wanluo Court, Fang Xing immediately went to his cave estate to count his resources and quietly calculate.

　　“It’s time to increase my cultivation level!”

　　After forming his foundation, increasing his cultivation levels had become quite a troublesome matter. For an ordinary blue foundation to increase to the second tier would require approximately one hundred supreme-quality Spirit Stones. A red foundation would require two hundred, and the “pure” white foundation would need three hundred. As for a golden foundation—like the one Prince Chu Huang had—it would need four hundred to break through into the second tier. The more powerful someone’s foundation, the more wasteful it became.

　　As for Fang Xing, his purple foundation required even more than Prince Chu Huang’s golden one did; all of the Qi from at least five hundred supreme-quality Spirit Stones would be necessary for a chance at forming the next step of his foundation.