Qin Xi didn't know what kind of species this giant yellow butterfly was, nor did he know its innate magic weapon, but since it blocked his sword light with yellow powder, it must be one of its killer moves.
At this moment, he had already thought of a countermeasure. With a wave of his hand, the sword light flew back into his sleeve. When the giant yellow butterfly flew over, he had already disappeared.
Dieyi stopped, her mouth opening and closing as she asked Jing Hu, "What's going on?"
Jing Hu also didn't know, but another beast cultivator shouted, "Elder Die, this person can use the power of the formation at will."
The two antennae on Dieyi's head swayed and sprinkled yellow powder.
This powder surrounded the team, forming a protective layer.
After doing this, it flashed back to the team and changed back to its human form.
It said, "Elder Jing, defense isn't my strong point. I'll have to trouble you."
Jing Hu waved his huge whale tail and said, "Don't worry."
The blowhole on its head suddenly sprayed out a monstrous water column, which turned into water droplets floating in the air.
These water droplets temporarily isolated the surrounding ice spikes and sparks, giving the beast cultivators space to rest. Moreover, as soon as Qin Xi came out, these water droplets would warn him.
"Greetings, elders." Once they were free, the beast cultivators saluted respectfully.
"No need to be so polite." Jing Hu opened his mouth full of sharp teeth, glanced at them, and said in a heavy voice, "Where are the other demons?"
A ninth rank demon cultivator stepped out and said with a trembling voice, "Elder Jing, six of them are confirmed to have perished, and three of them are missing …"
Dieyi frowned and said coldly, "Twenty-six beast cultivators entered the formation, and now only seventeen are left … You're really something!"
Although she didn't curse, her displeasure was clearly conveyed, and the beast cultivators were even more fearful.
Beast cultivators paid more attention to seniority than human cultivators, and there was a huge difference between ninth rank and tenth rank. Eighth rank beast cultivators were everywhere in the South Sea, and ninth rank beast cultivators weren't too rare, but tenth rank beast cultivators were rare.
Jing Hu said, "This formation is indeed something. We can't blame them."
Jing Hu's understanding made these Eighth and Ninth Rank Beast Cultivators feel grateful. One of the Ninth Rank Beast Cultivators mustered up his courage and reported, "Elder Jing, we've searched, but there's nothing special about the array. Please guide us, Elder Jing."
"Really?"
Jing Hu said, "The attainments of human cultivators in formations are much higher than us Yao cultivators. The so-called special objects don't necessarily have to be incompatible with the surrounding environment, but rather, they have to be objects with special energy."
"Yes," the Ninth Stage Demon Cultivator replied respectfully. "Please advise me, Elder Jing."
Jing Hu knew that without a certain level of attainment in array formations, it would be difficult to find the eye of the array. Therefore, he did not blame these demon cultivators too harshly.
It swung its tail and looked up at the world.
The attainments of human cultivators in formations were beyond their imagination. Their Mountain-guarding Formation could almost create a small world, which had its own rules of Heaven and Earth and its own circulation of Spiritual Qi. If they only treated it as an "illusion", they would die miserably.
Jing Hu scanned the world one by one.
The land above him had mountains, plains, deserts, and oceans. Except for the fact that there were no living creatures, it was almost a perfect world.
The sky beneath his feet was vast and boundless, as if there was only the sun …
The sun!
Jing Hu's eyes lit up, and an extremely fine stream of water sprayed out from the blowhole, pouring towards the sun.
When it got close to the sun, the stream of water quickly dried up and disappeared into the air.
This seemingly useless action caused Jing Hu's eyes to light up.
It could confirm that as soon as the stream of water approached, the sun would suddenly emit even more intense heat — — this kind of autonomous behavior was one of the characteristics of the eye of the array.
It shouted: "Attack the sun!"
"Yes"
The Yao cultivators responded in unison, each taking out a magic treasure refined from a certain part of their body and attacking the sun beneath their feet.
Jing Hu was its sharp teeth, while Die Yi was its wings. The two Tenth Stage Demon Cultivators attacked at the same time, one white and one yellow, two sharp auras shot towards the sun.
At this time, a figure in a white and blue robe silently appeared behind them, a red sword ray slid out from his sleeve. It was extremely thin, avoiding the dense water droplets, and slowly swam in.
The Yao cultivators attacking the sun didn't notice that Jing Hu's strength was at the top of the Yao cultivators, so they didn't expect to be able to avoid the water droplet barrier he created.
The red sword ray slowly penetrated the barrier and touched the bottom. All of a sudden, the red light soared, revealing a murderous aura. The sword ray instantly crushed the water droplet barrier around it, creating a passage several feet long.
The Yao cultivators reacted, and Die Yi sprinkled a layer of powder again, temporarily blocking the sword ray. However, under the chain reaction, the water droplet barrier collapsed one after another. In just a few seconds, it was completely shattered, and the water droplets were swept away by the gale without a trace.
The ice sparks, yellow sand, and gale that were blocked outside just now swept over again. In a hurry, many Eighth Stage Demon Cultivators didn't have time to defend and were hit in certain parts of their body.
Die Yi was furious and was about to change her target, but Qin Xi's figure flashed and disappeared again.
"Die Yi," Jing Hu advised, "We can't do anything to him in the great formation, so we can only guard against him.
You take them to attack the eye of the formation, and I'll guard against him. "
He had to defend against both the formation's own attacks and Qin Xi's sneak attacks from time to time, so he had to concentrate all his attention. He couldn't just use a barrier like just now.
Qin Xi didn't disappoint him. He appeared from time to time to harass Jing Hu and restrain him.
After another round of harassment, Qin Xi concealed his figure and said through his divine sense, "Tiange, how much longer can you hold on?"
Any formation was formed by the energy provided by spirit stones, and spirit stones had a limit.
Mo Tiange calculated that if the Heaven and Earth Inverted Formation was activated to the extreme, it might be able to kill most of the Yao cultivators inside. However, the two Tenth Rank Yao cultivators must have some life-saving secret technique, so they might not be able to kill them.
After the thunderous strike, the Heaven and Earth Inverted Formation would overdraw its energy and wouldn't have enough time to exchange for spirit stones, resulting in it being scrapped. At that time, they would be able to protect themselves against two Tenth Rank Yao cultivators and one Eighth Rank Yao cultivator, but they wouldn't be able to protect the low-level cultivators who hadn't finished being transported.
Therefore, they planned to reduce the formation's power in exchange for time.
In this case, they had to share the formation's power.
The formation would trap them and cause a certain amount of trouble, but it wouldn't be enough to kill them. The task of killing them fell on Qin Xi and Feng Ning, who were inside the formation.
However, Feng Ning entered the formation without bringing her jade talisman, so she could only wander around the periphery. Therefore, Qin Xi was the only real helper.
It was impossible for Qin Xi to confront them head-on. Even with the help of the formation, there was no way he could fight against a team of two Tenth Rank Yao cultivators by himself. Therefore, he could only harass them from the side to buy time.
Mo Tiange calculated again and said, "As long as they don't break the formation's eye in one go, they should be able to hold on for twenty hours."
"Twenty hours." Qin Xi heaved a sigh of relief. "That's enough."
It was impossible for them to break the formation's eye, because the sun wasn't the formation's eye but Mo Tiange deliberately disguised it. The real formation's eye was on the continent above their heads, right in front of them — the roaring sea.
The Yao cultivators never expected the formation's eye would be so big.
Seeing these Yao cultivators madly attacking the sun, Qin Xi appeared again. The Three Yang Real Fire Sword shone brightly and he suddenly attacked!
Jing Hu was already very careful, but he still didn't expect that Qin Xi, who had always been harassing him, would attack with his full strength. This sword strike directly shattered the defensive barrier he laid again and even hit his body. The Vermilion Bird's flames overbearingly burned his whole body black.
This time, it was Jing Hu who was furious, but in the next moment, Qin Xi once again disappeared without a sound.
* * *
As time passed, Mo Tiange became more and more relaxed, but Xuanyue Monster Master's face outside the mountain gate became more and more gloomy.
Listening to the movements inside the great formation, he almost couldn't help but want to call his subordinates back, but he restrained this impulse. He knew that if they continued to fight, they still had a chance to win. If he called them back now, the subordinates who had died in battle would be lost in vain.
He also knew that if they persisted, he would definitely win. Because the Celestial Pole's Immortal Alliance couldn't send reinforcements, could they defend for one day or a year with just the few of them?
Besides, what reason did they have to keep defending?
However, he hoped that the price could be small. At least, the two elders couldn't be harmed.
Inside the great formation, the light of the sun slowly dimmed. The beast cultivators all looked happy, and even Jing Hu, who was constantly harassed, spared some of his attention to pay attention to that side.
But he didn't dare to be careless. That human cultivator had tormented him enough. He had reason to believe that as long as he made a mistake, that human cultivator would come out and give them a fatal blow.
Fortunately, what he was worried about didn't happen. Dieyi flapped her wings, and a golden light flew towards the sun. With a loud "boom," the sun, which was on the verge of collapse, was finally completely destroyed.
The beast cultivators looked at each other in dismay as they watched the sun fly upward and finally fall into the roaring ocean, making a loud noise and even causing a tsunami on the ground.
There was no shaking of heaven and earth, and there was no collapse of heaven and earth. It was just so quiet — no, those icicles, sparks, gales, and lightning were still fiercely attacking them. There was only one explanation for this.
"It's not the formation eye …" Jing Hu said in a daze.
If the formation eye was destroyed, the formation would collapse. The sun was destroyed by them, but the formation was intact, which meant that the sun wasn't the formation eye at all.
The white-robed and blue-robed figures disappeared, and thousands of red sword lights suddenly appeared, blotting out the sky and rushing towards them. Jing Hu was in a trance. Only Dieyi quickly sprinkled yellow powder to block the sword lights, but it wasn't enough to dissolve them. He could only watch helplessly as the sword lights hit him.
The dazzling red light wasn't enough to kill them, but it injured them all.
And the culprit who killed them disappeared.
Outside the formation, a Sound-Transmitting Talisman flew out and fell into Mo Tiange's hand.
The Sound-Transmitting Talisman burned by itself, and Tang Shen's voice came: "Elder Ye, all disciples have been teleported."
Mo Tiange looked happy and quickly replied: "You're also teleported. Destroy the Transporting Formation after you're teleported."
She looked at the gloomy Xuanyue Monster Sovereign, made a hand seal, and waved the formation flag. With a "boom," the whole formation exploded.