Liu Qingyang sneered, "It is all because you idiots broke the array recklessly. Now the entire formation is about to collapse!"
"Nonsense!" Cang Dongqing screeched in response. "It was clearly you—"
"Enough!" Lin Shuang suddenly interrupted her, her sharp gaze sweeping over the runes lighting up on the stone pillars. "They are repairing the array."
"How is that possible? She is a mere qi condensation cultivator..." Cang Dongqing's expression became even more colorful. Lin Shuang looked coldly at her three fellow disciples, sneering in her heart.
She had tried to stop them from using such a method to force the array open from the beginning. No one knew what the consequences would be; if it caused a cave-in, they would all die here.
But those two idiots had decided to force the array just because of a few light words from Cang Dongqing.
Now, they had not cleared the array, nor had they obtained any opportunities. Instead, they needed others to save them, and yet they still wanted to turn their hands against their saviors. Lin Shuang truly did not know where their brains had gone.
Li Nanzhu's face was now deathly pale, and her hands were trembling uncontrollably.
She could feel the spiritual energy in her body nearing exhaustion, and the vitality of her wood spiritual root was almost at its limit. There were still three runes left on the stone pillar to be lit, but she was already at her breaking point.
Because the others had their backs turned to protect her, only the few from the Sword Heart Sect could notice her current state, but she lacked the strength even to cry out for help.
"She can't hold on." Seeing Li Nanzhu's face, Lin Shuang's heart tightened. She unhesitatingly pulled a high-grade spirit stone from her storage bag. "Catch!"
The spirit stone traced an arc through the air. Duan Xianxing instinctively reached for his sword, but fortunately, Zhu Yinxi noticed it was a spirit stone and pressed down on Duan Xianxing's hand in time.
"Lin Shuang!" Cang Dongqing screamed in disbelief, even addressing her directly by name. "You're helping them?"
Lin Shuang said coldly, "If she fails, we all die here."
Duan Xianxing originally wanted to run over and stuff more stones into Li Nanzhu's hands, but this time he was held back firmly by Liu Qingyang.
"You cannot go over there! If you enter now, the thunder-attribute spiritual energy you carry will directly interfere with the spiritual energy attunement!"
Zhu Yinxi saw the spirit stone simply roll to Li Nanzhu's feet, and she had no way to absorb it directly. He instructed the others to continue guarding and quickly scanned the surroundings, but there was nothing besides the stone walls to use as a foothold. Just as Zhu Yinxi was becoming anxious, a small figure rushed forward.
"Suisui!"
Duan Xianxing cried out in alarm. Even though he knew Suisui was worried about Li Nanzhu, he feared an accident might happen.
While everyone else was worried, only Cang Dongqing's eyes flashed with a hint of pleasure. 'Good, go ahead.' She wished for something to interrupt the stable balance of spiritual energy. Whether others lived or died had nothing to do with her. She had the trump card given by Ling Xiao, so she was not afraid of dying.
However, she was destined to be disappointed. Suisui rushed right in front of Li Nanzhu, yet the array did not undergo any changes.
Suisui quickly picked up the spirit stone, its bony claws carefully stuffing the stone into her sweat-drenched palm.
Feeling the cold touch in her palm, Li Nanzhu forced her eyes open and met the flickering blue fire in Suisui's hollow eye sockets. The little skeleton tilted its skull, its bony claws gently touching her trembling wrist with a clicking sound.
The moment the spirit stone touched her hand, a cool stream of spiritual energy flowed through the meridians of her arm into her dantian. Li Nanzhu's spirits lifted as she greedily absorbed this power, immediately guiding it into the stone pillar.
"This skeleton..." A hint of surprise flashed in Lin Shuang's eyes.
Liu Qingyang realized the truth. "Suisui has no spiritual energy fluctuations, so it can pass through the array safely!"
Suisui's movements did not pause for a second. Its bony claws nimbly grabbed the spirit stone, and it turned around to run back toward Zhu Yinxi.
The blue fire in the little skeleton's eye sockets flickered exceptionally bright, and the bell on its tailbone emitted a rapid jingling as it ran.
"Suisui, catch!" Zhu Yinxi quickly took three high-grade spirit stones from his storage bag and stuffed them into the gaps in Suisui's ribs.
Suisui made two clicking sounds in response and turned back toward Li Nanzhu.
"This..." Zhao Wuya and the other rogue cultivators watched in a daze. "This skeleton actually possesses such human-like intelligence?"
An old man among the rogue cultivators stroked his beard and sighed, "I have lived for over two hundred years, yet this is the first time I have seen a bone spirit with such sentience."
Another female cultivator nodded. "A skeleton with such sentience certainly cannot be an evil thing."
Cang Dongqing's face grew uglier by the second. She gripped Le Changxi's sleeve tightly. "Fourth Senior Brother, look at them..."
But Le Changxi rarely failed to respond immediately; he simply stared at the busy Suisui with a slight frown.
Qu Chen stood to the side, his gaze shifting between Li Nanzhu and Suisui with a look of deep thought.
Suisui had already made three trips, each time delivering the spirit stones accurately into Li Nanzhu's hands.
Another rune on the stone pillar lit up, but Li Nanzhu's face grew paler and paler—the replenishment speed of the high-grade spirit stones could no longer keep up with her consumption.
The others watched this situation with increasing anxiety and began to send spirit stones toward Suisui, but most were mid-grade spirit stones and low-grade spirit stones. Compared to high-grade spirit stones, these were merely a drop in the bucket.
"Not enough..." Li Nanzhu struggled to lift her head and look toward the others, her lips moving silently.
"Hold on!" Duan Xianxing was so anxious he stomped his feet, but he did not dare move forward. Liu Qingyang gripped his sleeve tight. "If you go over, you will interfere with the spiritual energy field!"
"What to do? What else can we do..." Duan Xianxing began rummaging through his storage bag when his eyes suddenly lit up. He pulled out a familiar box—it was exactly the highest-grade spirit stone crystals they had obtained in the alchemy room!
Zhu Yinxi and Liu Qingyang had not thought of it earlier simply because the items were too precious and stored separately from the other spirit stones. Just as they remembered and were about to pull them out, they saw Duan Xianxing unhesitatingly stuff the box into Suisui's arms.
"Suisui, go! Junior Sister, hold on!"
Suisui took the jade box and nimbly flipped open the lid. Three seemingly ordinary spirit stones lay quietly inside, their surfaces shimmering with a warm luster. At first glance, they looked no different from ordinary high-grade spirit stones and did not attract much attention from the others.
"Just this?" Cang Dongqing sneered. "And here I thought it was some kind of treasure!"
Hearing this, Duan Xianxing immediately retorted, "It's better than certain people who can't even produce an ordinary spirit stone! All you can do is make sarcastic remarks!"
"You!" Cang Dongqing's face turned green with rage. Qu Chen frowned imperceptibly and signaled Le Changxi to pull Cang Dongqing behind him, motioning for her to stop talking for now.
Suisui rushed toward Li Nanzhu with the jade box. Just as it was about to arrive, a massive rock suddenly fell from the ceiling, plummeting straight toward the little skeleton!
"Watch out!" Duan Xianxing's eyes nearly split from the strain.
At the critical moment, a brilliant sword light tore through the air, accurately splitting the boulder in two. Everyone looked at the person who had acted in shock—it was actually Qu Chen!
"Third Senior Brother?!" Cang Dongqing screamed in disbelief.
Qu Chen sheathed his sword, his expression normal. "I just don't want to die here." He paused and added, "And I don't want the Sword Heart Sect to bear the reputation of being ungrateful."
Le Changxi's body jolted at the words, and his gaze toward Qu Chen became more complex.
In that time, Suisui had already steadily placed the first crystal into Li Nanzhu's palm.
The moment the stone touched her hand, Li Nanzhu's whole body shook. She immediately focused her mind, concentrating on guiding this pure spiritual energy into the stone pillar. The seventh rune lit up in response.
"It works!" Duan Xianxing whispered, carefully controlling his volume.
Liu Qingyang scanned the surroundings to ensure they hadn't attracted too much attention, then gave Suisui a look. The little skeleton understood and immediately took out the second crystal.
Qu Chen's gaze followed Suisui's movements. When he saw the second crystal, he noticed that the rate at which the spirit stone was consumed was exceptionally slow, and Li Nanzhu's aura had clearly stabilized.
"This spiritual energy..." Le Changxi also noticed the abnormality and murmured under his breath.
Seeing that Le Changxi had noticed the anomaly as well, Qu Chen whispered, "That spirit stone... is not simple."
Le Changxi understood and asked softly, "Could it be..."
Qu Chen nodded imperceptibly, then shook his head to signal him not to say anything publicly.
Cang Dongqing noticed their strange behavior and pulled at Le Changxi's sleeve dissatisfied. "Fourth Senior Brother, what are you saying?"
Le Changxi opened his mouth but ultimately said nothing.
Cang Dongqing would not give up. "Fourth Senior Brother, they must be bluffing! We—"
"Enough!" Le Changxi snapped, which was rare for him. "Haven't you had enough?"
Cang Dongqing was stunned by the shout, her eyes instantly reddening. "Fourth Senior Brother, you're actually taking the side of outsiders..."
Lin Shuang cut in coldly, "If not for them, we would have been buried underground long ago."
Seeing Cang Dongqing's state, Le Changxi sighed and began to comfort her softly.
The rogue cultivators nearby were also paying attention. The old man seemed to notice something and suddenly sucked in a breath of cold air.
He stared at the fine patterns faintly appearing on the surface of the spirit stone, his lips trembling as if to say something, but Zhao Wuya pulled him back.
"Don't meddle," Zhao Wuya warned in a low voice, though his own eyes were filled with shock.
The effect of the second spirit stone was even more pronounced. Li Nanzhu's spiritual energy output suddenly became exceptionally steady. When the eighth rune lit up, the entire stone pillar began to glow with a faint golden light.
Time passed by the minute and second, but the light on the surface of the crystal remained stable. The others finally realized the anomaly; an ordinary high-grade spirit stone would have been exhausted long ago, but this seemingly ordinary crystal was still providing a continuous stream of spiritual energy!
"This is impossible!" Cang Dongqing finally realized something was wrong. "It's been the time of an incense stick! How could an ordinary spirit stone have such an effect?!"
She turned sharply toward Liu Qingyang, the fires of jealousy burning in her eyes. However, hampered by his status and her own hidden motives, she could only grit her teeth. "Young Master Liu is quite generous, even willing to give such a treasure to outsiders!"
Cang Dongqing did not believe for a second that Duan Xianxing could produce such a thing. It had to be something Liu Qingyang had given them.
Liu Qingyang arched an eyebrow, neither admitting nor denying it. "Saving lives is what matters."
Cang Dongqing's breathing grew rapid as she watched Liu Qingyang's focused profile, her heart in turmoil. Such a thing could only come from the foundation of the Water Moon Sect.
If Li Nanzhu's group hadn't interfered at the inn... if she could have gained his favor... such a precious item should have belonged to her!
This thought made her even more irritable, and she couldn't help but tug at Le Changxi's sleeve. "Fourth Senior Brother..."
Le Changxi shook his head in annoyance, signaling her to keep quiet, though his gaze toward Liu Qingyang also held more profound thought.
When the third spirit stone was taken out by Suisui, the entire stone hall fell silent for a moment. The halo flowing on the surface of the stone suddenly became restrained. However, most people present were golden core stage cultivators, and combined with the uniqueness of the previous two stones, even a fool could see its extraordinary nature now.
Lin Shuang's pupils constricted, and she instinctively gripped her sword hilt.
Cang Dongqing's face changed completely, the jealousy in her eyes almost becoming physical. She wanted so badly to rush forward and snatch that spirit stone... but her logic told her she couldn't.
"Hold on..." Zhu Yinxi murmured, his jade flute clutched tight.
The others also watched Li Nanzhu's every move with tension. Since it was a matter of life and death, they couldn't help but hold their breath.
It must succeed! It must!
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