Chapter 373: Thunder Prison Array, Suppressing and Killing Wang Yuan

Inside the Ninth Mountain.

Dark clouds swirled, gathering and dispersing, so gloomy it felt as if a black curtain had shrouded a radius of a thousand miles.

Silver snakes coiled, and thunderclaps exploded.

The deeper one went, the more frequent and dense the lightning storms became.

Even a Foundation Establishment cultivator would suffer light injuries if struck.

If one encountered those continuous, massive lightning storms, no matter how formidable a Foundation Establishment cultivator might be, they would surely perish within.

Perhaps only a Core Formation True Person could barely withstand it.

But that was only a "perhaps."

This was the might of heaven and earth!

Even if it wasn't intentionally targeting cultivators who had gathered great power within themselves, it was not something ordinary people could treat lightly.

It was hard to imagine what level the lightning punishment would reach if the legendary Nascent Soul tribulation were to descend.

The tribulation lightning produced in such a punishment was entirely different from ordinary thunder and lightning; Foundation Establishment and Core Formation cultivators would die upon contact!

*Swish!

A sound of breaking through the air came from the mountainside.

Strong winds billowed, and gravel scattered.

A figure suddenly stopped, the spiritual energy wings on his back slowly retracting.

As the misty air currents billowed, the cultivator's true appearance was revealed.

His facial features were well-defined, his lips tightly pressed, and his sword-like brows and star-like eyes held an unyielding chill.

"Blood Demon!"

"A False Core stage cultivator!"

"No wonder no ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivator has survived after encountering him."

"His magic treasures are both offensive and defensive, and he even possesses the Blood Escape technique for accelerated flight; he is almost flawless."

"If I hadn't used tactics to keep my distance from the start, laying down Vine Technique, Earth Mountain Technique, and Thousand-Fold Peak along the way to drag him down and suppress him, and then used the Profound Fire Sword to unleash the Blazing Sun Technique, I fear I wouldn't have been able to harm him in the slightest."

Luo Chen opened his mouth and exhaled a long breath of turbid air.

In that battle just now, he appeared to have the upper hand, suppressing the opponent from start to finish.

But that was merely an appearance.

The opponent's magic treasures and methods were not inferior to his own, and because of the vast gap in cultivation base, there was an insurmountable chasm between the two.

If they had fought head-on, without retreating or fleeing.

Even if Luo Chen had exhausted all his trump cards, after several hundred rounds, he certainly would no longer be the opponent's match.

His only advantage was probably his flight speed.

The speed he had just unleashed hadn't reached his limit; he had only used seventy percent.

In other words, if Luo Chen hadn't wanted to fight the opponent, he could have kept his distance from the very beginning and shaken off the Blood Demon.

But that would have meant having a pursuer behind him at all times.

A maggot on the tarsal bone—the most disgusting thing!

That was why Luo Chen had laid out layers of lethal moves, attempting to severely injure the opponent.

Killing him would naturally be best, but if he couldn't be killed, a deterrent would suffice.

It was a pity the opponent actually possessed a defensive magic treasure, the Red Silk.

It prevented Luo Chen from achieving complete success.

"But now, he shouldn't dare to pursue anymore!"

Standing on the mountainside, Luo Chen looked into the distance along the path he had come with his spiritual eyes.

Limited by the environment, his spiritual sense couldn't probe very far, only a few miles.

But his "thousand-mile eyes" did not have this limitation.

Even though he couldn't see clearly due to the terrain and trees, he could still estimate the general range.

Before long, under Luo Chen's focused gaze, he vaguely detected the opponent's tracks.

Inside the dense forest, a streak of light was flying close to the ground, gradually leaving the Ninth Mountain.

Seeing this, Luo Chen finally let out a sigh of relief.

Although he didn't fear the opponent, provoking such an enemy for no reason was ultimately not a good thing.

After all, he had important matters to attend to.

"Speaking of which, what is this person's background?"

"His appearance, voice, and even height and build were all disguised. A loose cultivator afraid of trouble is possible, but he looks more like a true disciple of a major sect!"

"An ordinary loose cultivator couldn't reach the Great Perfection of Foundation Establishment, let alone the temporary realm of False Core. Anyone with such achievements would definitely be a famous figure within the Yuding Domain!"

"But if he were a true disciple of a major sect, he should only be targeting one side, not offending everyone equally."

"Could it be a deliberate ruse?"

Luo Chen recalled the various methods the opponent had displayed earlier.

For a moment, he was completely clueless.

The opponent hadn't revealed any iconic cultivation techniques or moves, and his magic treasure flying sword was of the more common variety.

The only conspicuous thing was that Red Silk defensive magic treasure.

But he had never heard of this object before.

"Right, just now, under my continuous fierce attacks, he revealed a flaw. If it weren't for the lightning storm descending, I could have at least injured him!"

"If a False Core stage cultivator had refined a defensive magic treasure for over a hundred years, such a flaw would absolutely not appear."

"In other words, the time he obtained that Red Silk defensive magic treasure probably wasn't long, which is why he..."

Luo Chen's train of thought broke.

This discovery still couldn't help him determine the opponent's specific identity.

Shaking his head, Luo Chen tossed a high-grade Dragon-Ascension Pill into his mouth.

He used his Sword Pellet to open a cave in the mountain wall and was about to drill in, but frowned and backed out.

The Ninth Mountain's body actually contained significant thunder power, making it unsuitable for quiet cultivation.

Shaking his head, Luo Chen took out a Cloud Mist Illusion Array to conceal his figure.

He sat cross-legged on the rocky platform on the mountainside to regulate his breathing.

His spiritual energy reserves were indeed incomparably thick, not inferior to any great cultivator at the late Foundation Establishment stage; he dared to fight even against a False Core stage cultivator.

But that didn't mean he would charge around recklessly in the Ninth Mountain.

He had to keep his state at its peak at all times.

Only then could he face any enemy without any worries!

Time passed slowly.

Merely refining pills without involving the inhalation of heaven and earth spiritual energy meant time passed naturally fast.

After only the time it takes for a stick of incense to burn, Luo Chen opened his eyes with satisfaction.

In this amount of time, he naturally couldn't fully refine the massive medicinal power of the high-grade Dragon-Ascension Pill, but he had absorbed seven or eight tenths of it.

As he began to open his apertures, his physique became increasingly formidable.

The number of high-grade pills he could refine daily had also broken through to two, which could be considered a disguised increase in his cultivation speed.

If this news were leaked, it would surely drop jaws to the floor.

An ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivator would need at least a day or two to refine a second-grade low-grade pill. If it were high-grade, it would take three to five days!

Considering the lingering poison of the pills, they would also have to set aside time to slowly expel the toxins.

But for Luo Chen, these were not major issues at all.

He was an alchemist and had the deepest insights into how to quickly absorb the spiritual energy contained in pills.

Coupled with the "Clear Source Wonderful Pill Method," a technique for neutralizing pill toxins, he had completely removed the worry of lingering pill poison.

"No wonder the Qingdan Valley has the largest number of Foundation Establishment cultivators and once dominated the Yuding Domain. Even if not everyone is like me, at least sixty or seventy percent of that level could pile up a large batch of Foundation Establishment cultivators!"

Sighing with emotion, Luo Chen's heart suddenly stirred.

He reached toward his waist, and a jade pendant appeared before him.

Spiritual light flickered upon it!

Luo Chen knew exactly what this meant!

"It's nearby!"

Luo Chen's eyes lit up; he put away the Cloud Mist Illusion Array and leaped into the deeper parts of the Ninth Mountain.

Inside a mountain valley.

Two figures stood facing each other, each occupying a position.

Both pairs of eyes flickered, staring fixedly at the valley below.

Inside, lightning flashed and thunder roared, as if lightning storms were intersecting.

But looking closely, it wasn't a lightning storm, but a temporarily constructed second-grade array!

Inside, there were two more figures.

One sat cross-legged, continuously casting small flags from his hands, seemingly presiding over the array.

The other figure flashed about, continuously charging at the array, occasionally blasting out a palm, the surging energy shaking the array.

Occasionally, thunder would fall, but it was all washed away by the massive blood-colored energy swirling around him.

Judging by his momentum, this array seemed unable to trap him!

Ku Chan's expression was gloomy.

"This person's attainments in body refining are actually this terrifying!"

"When we first met, he was only at the Great Perfection of Dark Energy. After months of pursuit, he has actually mastered Transformation Energy. Even Daoist Yang's Thunder Prison cannot suppress him!"

He saw it clearly.

Every time those thunder chains extending from the array tried to bind Wang Yuan.

They would be calmly neutralized by the blood-colored energy swirling around him.

Even though he had tricked him into the array, he had no way to deal with him for the time being.

In fact, the opponent was still constantly trying to crash through the array.

The Transformation Energy level in the second realm of body refining was comparable to the eighth layer of the Foundation Establishment stage!

Especially since the opponent was a dual cultivator of magic and body!

Suddenly!

From within the array, Yang Wei's anxious voice came.

"This person is no mindless brute; he seems to understand the principles of the array and is heading straight for the array eye."

"Ku Chan, Daoist Yan Leizi, quickly enter the array to assist me!"

Almost as soon as his words fell.

Inside the array.

A low roar, like the bellowing of an ox and the howling of a tiger, erupted.

Wang Yuan's figure began to grow rapidly.

Initially only seven feet tall, in the blink of an eye, he broke through one *zhang*, then two *zhang*.

In just two breaths, his entire person stood three *zhang* tall!

Terrifying blood-colored energy swirled around him.

His rock-like muscles were exposed, gleaming with a bronze luster.

Veins, like coiling dragons, knotted across his body.

With every breath he took, he whipped up howling gales.

With a wave of his millstone-sized palm, large swaths of thunder chains derived from the array were torn down by him.

As his body grew larger, he took steps, charging toward Yang Wei, who was sitting cross-legged in the void.

*Rumble...

The array was becoming unstable!

Ku Chan's expression changed drastically.

Opposite him, another young man wearing a black and red jacket had eyes shining with excitement.

"Let me go and meet him!"

"Daoist Yan Leizi, wait!" Ku Chan called out hurriedly.

Yan Leizi looked at him, puzzled.

Ku Chan took a deep breath and pointed at the sky.

Yan Leizi suddenly realized.

"Fine, you go alone. If a small lightning storm occurs, I will naturally neutralize it for you. However, are you sure you can deal with him?"

Ku Chan's expression turned ferocious.

"I am at the seventh layer of Foundation Establishment, plus the assistance of Daoist Yang, who is also at the seventh layer, and this Thunder Prison Array constructed by combining the terrain of the Trapped Sky Valley."

"If this still can't suppress and kill him, then what revenge am I seeking?"

Yan Leizi raised an eyebrow and said no more.

Ku Chan took a deep breath, his spiritual energy surging and spreading throughout his body.

A jade ruler appeared in his hand.

Then, he leaped and entered the array.

Before long.

The sound of wind and thunder roared from within the array.

The jade ruler, flashing with white jade light, continuously expanded to several dozen *zhang* in size, like a giant door panel, constantly slamming toward Wang Yuan, who was also huge in size.

Yan Leizi watched this scene, unable to contain his excitement.

He was both shocked by the enemy Wang Yuan's body refining attainments and amazed by the trump cards of great late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators like Ku Chan and Yang Wei.

If he hadn't relied on the special environment of the Nine Thunder Mountains.

Being a mere sixth-layer Foundation Establishment cultivator, he wouldn't dare to sit on equal footing with them.

However!

As long as he waited for this war to end, relying on accumulated merits, he could advance to the late Foundation Establishment stage upon returning to the sect.

At that time, he would no longer have any shortcomings in his cultivation base.

He might even be able to compete for the position of the Yan Alliance's Daoist Son with his father's support!

"Right now, I am not inferior to you all. In the future, I can even leave you far behind."

Yan Leizi watched the battle in the array, his heart surging with passion.

He saw it clearly.

After Ku Chan entered to pin him down, Yang Wei, presiding over the array, finally breathed a sigh of relief, and more thunder chains emerged from above the array to bind Wang Yuan.

Now, three chains had already pierced through the opponent's feet and abdomen.

As long as seven chains pierced his body, the "Seven Thunders Prison" formation could be formed.

At that time, Wang Yuan would only be able to surrender and await execution!

"The path of arrays is indeed strong. With preparation, suppressing those of the same rank is easy, and killing enemies across ranks is also simple."

"If Yang Wei had been by my side back then, we wouldn't have been obstructed by that Thunder Array Master, and I wouldn't have been in such a sorry state, nearly perishing under the Five Thunders Bombardment."

Just as he was sighing over the methods of those in the array.

He suddenly felt something was wrong.

He looked around; it was quiet.

He looked up at the sky; although dark clouds were gathering, no lightning storm was born.

Trapped Sky Valley was a peculiar terrain in the Ninth Mountain.

It had thick dark clouds covering a hundred miles year-round, but rarely had lightning storms.

So, where did that feeling of wrongness come from?

Yan Leizi frowned, his sharp eyes scanning the surroundings frantically.

"Who is it? Get out here!"

A loud shout, but no response.

But it was precisely this lack of response that made him feel the danger was even more intense.

Suddenly.

He looked down at the ground; a small pebble had rolled inexplicably.

"Hmm?"

Just as he was puzzled.

The next moment!

The ground began to tremble violently, and countless rocks shook.

As the shaking intensified, larger rocks fell from the cliffs on both sides into Trapped Sky Valley.

"An earthquake?"

Yan Leizi was suspicious.

Suddenly!

He looked down into Trapped Sky Valley.

The earthquake and collapsing mountains resulted in the shifting of earth energy and changes in terrain.

As a result, Yang Wei's Thunder Prison trap would inevitably be affected.

If Wang Yuan escaped, relying on his formidable abilities, the three of them might not be able to keep him.

"No!"

"Must finish this quickly!"

"I must enter the array and join forces with Ku Chan to suppress Wang Yuan!"

Just as he was about to step forward.

A hearty laugh came from outside the mountain.

"Daoist, please stay your step!"

Yan Leizi turned his head abruptly.

A man wearing a red cloud Daoist robe stepped out from the void, dragging a Profound Fire Sword behind him. Streaks of red energy were constantly spitting from the tip of the sword, and as they spat, the energy permeated a radius of several miles.

It seemed as if that sword was pulling on the entire world!

As he approached step by step, the shaking of the earth became more pronounced.

Vaguely, a great terror was slowly descending.