“What do you mean by them not being alone?” Fei Weng asked with a frown. “Who is there with them? No, even before that, where are they right now?”

While Sect Protector Pei continued his heated argument with the other deacons and protectors over what decision had to be made regarding San Wanfan’s party, Fei Weng had silently stood behind Zhao Yunxiao to see just how the latter was intending to deal with the current situation.

Yet despite having heard the entire process, he was still unsure about the current situation that San Wanfan’s party was in.

And after hearing Zhao Yunxiao’s warning to San Wanfan’s party, he could no longer rein in his curiosity.

“If I am not wrong, they should be at Trident Lake right now,” Zhao Yunxiao answered without looking back.

“Trident Lake!” Fei Weng understood the moment he heard that name.

This was not a very well-known location among disciples, largely because participants were usually only interested in obtaining treasures, and no one had ever found any extraordinary treasures there.

But as someone who had been put in charge of the observers for years, it would be strange for Fei Weng to not remember this place.

After all, while it might not be an exaggerated number, there had still been quite a few participants who were forced to escape from the Four Symbols Mystic Realm after wandering into this place.

Trident Lake – a name given to remind everyone of the powerful guardian that resided at this place.

If the Mo Group was truly at the Trident Lake right now, then Zhao Yunxiao’s instruction to hide their presences and escape as soon as possible was definitely the right approach!

***

The cloud of blood covered quite a large area, but that was only by the standards of ordinary mortals. With nothing holding her back, it did not take long for a cultivator like Quan Hui to swim right through the cloud of blood.

And as she emerged from the other side, she immediately spotted the Mo Group desperately trying to swim to the other shore.

Quan Hui narrowed her eyes.

Wishful thinking!

Opening her hand like a claw and gathering essence energy upon it, her hand burst into dark red flames despite being underwater.

With a swipe of her ‘claw’, five streaks of intense flames burst forth towards the escaping Mo Group. These streaks of flame traversed through the water with ease, leaving white bubbling trails in their wake as they instantly vaporised the lake water upon contact.

Even if San Wanfan had somehow failed to sense the eruption of energy behind them, it would be impossible for him to miss the sudden appearance of an intense light source within the lake.

“You guys go on ahead. I will take care of this!” he immediately sent a voice transmission to his party members.

Cultivators of the Origin Core realm had the ability to use voice transmissions – a way of directly sending their voices into the heads of those in the vicinity. Doing this would prevent their conversations from being overheard by others, as well as allow for communication in environments where it was difficult to speak.

After informing his party members of his intention, San Wanfan decisively turned around to face the oncoming attack alone.

But at the same time, he could not help but recall the message that he had received from the sect administrators.

You are not alone in the lake.

Shit!

In just about any other situation, San Wanfan would have chosen to intercept this attack with a projectile of his own since that was the safest approach. However, he decided against it this time.

Whatever it was in the lake with them, he did not want to risk drawing its attention to himself by releasing his essence energy in a conspicuous manner!

Instead, he gritted his teeth and raised his long glaive as a guard in front of him, shrouding it with just the bare amount of essence energy.

As he watched the streaks of fire draw closer, San Wanfan could only hope that he was making the right choice.

Boom-!

The five streaks of fire exploded upon contact with San Wanfan’s long glaive, engulfing him in an instant.

San Wanfan’s minimal defence failed to completely block out this explosive damage, and the flames instantly reached his skin. Nevertheless, he clenched his hands around his long glaive to endure the pain, cleverly using the explosive force from the impact to propel himself back and continue his escape.

Quan Hui frowned and was just about to continue her pursuit when she suddenly heard a voice transmission from her party member.

“Wait, stop chasing them!”

These words caused Quan Hui to stop for a moment, and this moment of hesitation could be said to have saved her life.

The very next moment, a grey trident shot up from the depths of the lake, passing right in front of her very eyes, just inches away from her face.

Had she carried on with her pursuit, there was no doubt that she would have been in the direct path of the trident.

Or perhaps it was more accurate to say that this trident was an attack aimed right at her!

But before Quan Hui even had the time to think about whether she should be feeling rage or fear, she suddenly felt a powerful suction force acting upon her, pulling her deeper into the lake.

This suction force was not some special technique. Instead, it was a natural phenomenon brought about by the sheer speed and power of the passing trident.

As it tore through the lake, the trident had directly pushed out all the water in its vicinity, creating a huge vacuum that immediately sucked in everything around it like a vertical black hole.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

With how close Quan Hui was to the path of the trident, she was naturally subjected to the full brunt of this suction force.

That was when she finally felt her heart skip a beat.

Damn it!

Quan Hui drove her dantian to the limit and channelled all the essence energy she could, all in a bid to resist the suction force and retreat.

What happened so far gave her all the information that she needed. There was no doubt that if she were to allow herself to be pulled in, that would be the end of her!

At this moment, she felt a chain wrap around her waist, quickly pulling her back.

Quan Hui immediately calmed down a little, borrowing the force of the chain to pull away.

Thankfully, the suction force did not last too long as the lake water quickly moved in to fill the vacuum. Even then, she was not intending to wait around for the master of the trident to appear.

Along with her party members, Quan Hui turned around and headed straight for shore, instantly giving up on their pursuit of the Mo Group. No words had to be exchanged for all of them to realise that their top priority right now was to get out of the lake as quickly as possible!

***

“Energy expenditure and movements stabilising at a low level. San Wanfan’s party is likely to have either escaped danger, or they have already gotten captured,” Zhao Yunxiao reported matter-of-factly.

“What do you mean?” Sect Protector Pei immediately came over and asked. “There is a huge difference between escaping and getting captured! Which one is it?”

The other deacons and protectors similarly came over and gathered near Zhao Yunxiao, eager to find out what happened.

“Reporting to Senior Pei, it is more likely that they have escaped, but we don’t know that for sure,” Zhao Yunxiao said honestly. “That is, unless we want to send them a message to find out if they are safe.”

“This...” Sect Protector Pei hesitated, aware of the many eyes that were on him at the moment. “Forget it, it is good enough that their situation has stabilised for now. Now that they have some time to think things through, I’m sure they will be able to find a way to deal with things themselves.”

Sending messages to get participants out of a tricky situation was one thing, but sending messages just to check on their well-being was a completely different matter altogether.

It could easily be construed as a display of both wastefulness and bias, considering how sending each message would cost the sect spirit stones.

If they had to constantly check on all participants just to see how they could help, then the spirit stones expenditure would be off the charts.

That aside, it would also defeat the purpose of letting them explore the mystic realm in the first place, which was supposed to help them gain experience under a minimal level of intervention.

Fei Weng nodded in satisfaction upon seeing this, agreeing with Sect Protector Pei’s decision.

In addition, unlike Sect Protector Pei, he was rather familiar with Zhao Yunxiao. Seeing the look of relief on Zhao Yunxiao’s face told him all he needed to know.

He knew that Zhao Yunxiao should have a good gauge on the probability of each scenario, and would not have shown such an expression if the chances of the Mo Group being captured were high.

With that in mind, Fei Weng decided to leave Zhao Yunxiao to manage things here while he attended to the other observers.

Who knew that just as he was about to walk away, Zhao Yunxiao would suddenly speak up once again?

“Shu Yifei activated the jade tablet and is returning!” Zhao Yunxiao announced.

While saying that, he had to consciously suppress the corner of his lips from twitching.

This Shu Yifei was not a member of San Wanfan’s Mo Group. Instead, she belonged to the Wei Group led by Nuo Qianling.

It really was one problem after another!

“Physicians, get ready!” Fei Weng turned around and shouted.

Just like with Yuan Shang earlier, a streak of light shot out from the huge energy globe above, turning into Shu Yifei in the participants’ tent.

Two physicians rushed to the scene. Seeing how her clothes were in tatters and almost revealing a little too much skin, the female physicians immediately put up a small curtain to shield her from the eyes of others while they examined and treated the various wounds on her body.

Unlike Yuan Shang, this Shu Yifei was actually quite heavily injured!

“What happened?” a deacon from the Wei Faction asked from outside the curtain.

This was Deacon Que, the same person who had asked about Nuo Qianling’s party when Zhao Yunxiao reported on them entering battle previously.

Being from the Wei Faction as well, it was not surprising that he, who looked to be a bald old man in his eighties, was interested in the situation of participants from the same inner sect faction.

“...”

“What’s going on? Is she not in a state to answer?” Deacon Que directed the question to the physicians this time.

“That’s not it...” one of the physicians replied hesitantly.

Such a response caused Deacon Que to turn solemn. “It is fine if you don’t wish to reveal what you guys are up to. But I hope you realise that by doing so, you will also be robbing your party of the opportunity to receive help. And seeing how you have just escaped the mystic realm, your other party members probably aren’t doing too well on their own either!”

“...”

Seeing that Shu Yifei was still being all tight-lipped, Deacon Que was just about to give up on her and walk away when he suddenly heard a voice transmission coming from her.

Hmm?

Deacon Que’s solemn expression slowly softened as he listened to most of the details regarding the Wei Group’s current situation, though Shu Yifei deliberately left out what exactly they had found encased within the black ice.

Blacksnow Tundra?

Deacon Que had indeed heard of this region within the Four Symbols Mystic Realm. However, it was not exactly the most popular area. Yes, there had definitely been rare treasures discovered there, but the harsh conditions were a huge risk as well.

To think that they had tried to challenge the Blacksnow Tundra, and even managed to find something encased in black ice.

No wonder Shu Yifei was being all secretive about the matter. Even Deacon Que could not help but feel interested in this potential treasure!

If possible, he really wanted to help them retrieve it.

The question was... how?

Deacon Que might know a few things about Blacksnow Tundra, but he did not remember hearing about anything that the party had encountered – neither this seemingly indestructible black ice, nor the similarly tough skeletons!

At this moment, he could not help but turn his attention towards Fei Weng. As he watched Fei Weng busily managing other observers, his eyes lit up with hope.

Surely, the deacon in charge of the observers would have a good idea on how to help!