Chapter 212: Captured Alive, Soul-Searching and Spirit-Seizing

Bang!

After the giant whale light-shadow shattered, countless blue streams of light splashed in all directions.

The great seal that had condensed the giant whale light-shadow let out a mournful cry, then flew backward at high speed amidst violent trembling.

At the same time, the sword light wielded by Lu Yuan continued its momentum unabated, sweeping over Qin Ruoning—who had been frozen by the Immobilization Technique—like a plow clearing a field.

Chi chi chi.

The protection of the 【Dragon-Suppressing Gold Armor Talisman】 trembled violently. Qin Ruoning only felt the opponent's sword light transform into something formless; it was like wind, like rain, like thunder, like lightning. Looking up, she could not see its shape; looking down, she could not track its path. It was suddenly wild, suddenly profound, suddenly soft, suddenly fierce.

Under the sword light, the whistling gale across the sky seemed to vanish in an instant. The sword light surged like an angry dragon tossing and turning, with lightning flashing chaotically. The biting, majestic, and chilling Sword Intent completely filled her entire field of vision, also causing the golden dragon light-shadow protecting her body to emit constant mournful cries as its flowing light shattered and scattered!

There was no doubt that the terror of the opponent's sword-wielding technique meant that once the Dragon-Suppressing Gold Armor Talisman was breached, she would inevitably follow in Bai Qianfeng's footsteps. Facing a life-and-death crisis and suppressed to the point where she could barely move, Qin Ruoning gritted her teeth. A faint light flashed from the Storage Bracelet on her wrist, and a round ball—radiating strange colors and filled with a destructive aura—appeared in her hand. She then exhausted all her strength to mobilize her Dharma Power, wanting to launch this object.

However, Lu Yuan, who had taken in the opponent's every movement, did not even change his gaze, and before she could act, he raised his hand and pointed again:

"Freeze!"

Hum.

The sealing power that suppressed Heaven and Earth swept across the world. Aside from 【Sword Technique】 and 【Wind Control】, the powerful means of 【Immobilization】 had long been promoted by Lu Yuan to the level of a Supernatural Power; otherwise, it would have been impossible to easily freeze an existence at the same level of cultivation as himself.

Under the stimulation of Dharma Power, the immobilization erupted with soul-shaking might once again. Qin Ruoning, who was already struggling with difficulty under the previous immobilization Supernatural Power, was suddenly as if suppressed by the Five-Finger Mountain; let alone casting spells, even blinking her eyelids was impossible!

At the same time, the Flying Sword and Sword Pill wielded by Lu Yuan were like thunder and swift lightning. In the blink of an eye, after dozens of slashes and shredding, they completely ground the protection of the Dragon-Suppressing Gold Armor Talisman into powder, and then, with lightning speed, severed the entire right arm of Qin Ruoning that was holding the round ball magic tool.

With her right arm severed from her body, heart-wrenching pain swept through her body and mind. Yet, at this moment, Qin Ruoning could neither cry out in pain nor resist; she could only watch helplessly as that terrifying sword light hung across her neck like a swimming dragon, needing only a single thought from the opponent to take her head!

This time, the duel ended in a complete and miserable defeat for the two of them. The duel ended so quickly that it did not even take half a cup of tea's time.

Only then did Lu Yuan leisurely arrive before Qin Ruoning, raising his hand to nail rays of light onto her and Bai Qianfeng, forming a small, miraculous array that completely sealed their Dharma Power.

This was naturally a formation from 【Array Formation】, called the Seal Spirit Absolute Array, which could powerfully seal the Dharma Power and divine sense of cultivators within the array, causing their cultivation to drop until they were like mortals.

Having mastered the Supernatural Power of 【Array Formation】, Lu Yuan could already simplify the complex for most low-to-mid-tier arrays, forming them with a wave of his hand. Although the Seal Spirit Absolute Array he condensed with Dharma Power at this moment was only a simplified version and its effect was far inferior to one set up with Array Flags, it was sufficient to seal the two's Dharma Power for a short time and prevent them from acting like cornered beasts.

Just like that, Lu Yuan conjured a hand of Dharma Power and grabbed Qin Ruoning and the limb-less, human-stick-like Bai Qianfeng as if they were two ants.

At the same time, he also retrieved Qin Ruoning's severed arm and the spherical object in its hand. After examining it carefully, he discovered it was a magic tool the size of an adult's fist, resembling crystal.

However, through the transparent shell of this magic tool, one could clearly see a point of faint black fire jumping inside, vaguely releasing an ominous aura, which even caused Lu Yuan's Sprout Sensing Technique to release a strong sense of threat.

He could not help but raise his gaze and sweep it toward Qin Ruoning:

"Interesting, what is this?"

"How could it be like this..."

At this moment, Bai Qianfeng, whose chest had been pierced and who had become a human stick, still had one breath left. After Qin Ruoning was also captured alive and he himself had no power left to resist, only despair remained on his pained and ferocious face:

"You, a cultivator of the Lower Realm, how could you have such cultivation and means? Who exactly are you!"

Although the two of them were at the early stage of Golden Core, they had entered this realm for over ten years, and the gap between them and the mid-stage was not too far.

With the two of them joining forces, they could even contend with or even repel a mid-stage Golden Core cultivator. Yet now, in just a short moment, they had been completely defeated by someone with the same cultivation as them, or perhaps even slightly inferior, without even causing the slightest damage to him.

Even though they were both at the early Golden Core level, such a huge gap made him nearly insane.

"Who am I?"

Lu Yuan smiled:

"A cultivator who is not quite like you."

Seeing that Qin Ruoning was still frozen and unable to move or speak, Bai Qianfeng's face turned deathly pale, and he said intermittently:

"You... you act, it is nothing more than for those mortals. The one who brought down the snow disaster was me, it has nothing to do with her, let her go..."

Unable to even save himself, he was still pleading for the other person; the relationship between the two was clearly unusual. Lu Yuan said with a calm gaze:

"You two came together; not stopping it makes her an accomplice. She deserves this outcome."

Bai Qianfeng gritted his teeth and said hurriedly:

"I... we are, after all, cultivators from the Upper Realm. If something happens to us in this realm, you absolutely will not be able to escape the consequences..."

"Our cultivation in the Upper Realm is far from top-tier. The one who sent us through the passage was a Nascent Soul Great Cultivator. If you kill us, he will surely find out, thereby bringing a great catastrophe to your Lower Realm!"

"Is that so?"

Lu Yuan looked at him as if he were a fool, and said playfully:

"The Great Evolution Mending Heaven Array I set up should have established a slight connection to the severed two-realm passage, allowing you Upper Realm cultivators to discover it and use some special method to send you two down to check the situation."

This slight connection should be very fragile and unstable. That so-called Nascent Soul Great Cultivator of yours being able to send you two over should be the limit. Let alone him, even those with slightly higher cultivation than you would likely find it difficult to pass through the fragile two-realm passage."

If I stop the Mending Heaven Array, or restart the Sealing Heaven and Earth Array set up by the ancient Human Emperor, I could cut off the connection between the two realms again in an instant. At that time, that Nascent Soul Great Cultivator of yours would be equally helpless. Am I right?"

With every word Lu Yuan spoke, Bai Qianfeng's face turned a shade paler. By the end, his face was ashen, clearly having been completely seen through.

And at this moment.

The sealing power on her body finally weakened slightly. Qin Ruoning was also swept by indescribable despair in body and mind. She stared at Lu Yuan in disbelief and let out a miserable laugh:

"Good, good. I never thought that this barren and desolate Lower Realm would actually produce such a terrifying figure as you."

"If you were in the Upper Realm, provided you did not fall, you would surely become a Nascent Soul True Monarch, or even a Transformation Spirit Giant."

"This time, the two of us have fallen. What do you want?"

Lu Yuan smiled but did not say much:

"Whether you live or die depends on whether you are cooperative enough."

Saying this, he used his Dharma Power hand to grab the two and return the way he came, preparing to interrogate them in detail about the situation in the Upper Realm.

However, halfway there, he encountered Chen Zhantang, who was anxiously rushing over by Wind Control.

When he saw the miserable state of Bai Qianfeng and Qin Ruoning in Lu Yuan's hand, he was immediately dumbfounded:

"Master, this is?"

"These two are cultivators from the Upper Realm; they have been captured by me."

Lu Yuan said:

"I will take them back to the Dao Palace for interrogation first. The snow disaster has been broken; the relief and pacification within Tianjing City will be left to you."

Never having expected that Bai Qianfeng and Qin Ruoning, these two mysterious figures, were truly from the Upper Realm, Chen Zhantang had ten thousand questions he wanted to ask in his heart, but at this moment he could only forcibly suppress them, bowing to offer a salute:

"Yes, Master, this disciple will go at once!"

Immediately, he went straight back to Tianjing City to pacify the shocked high-level officials of the Council and the common people, while Lu Yuan brought the two controlled individuals back into the main hall of the Dao Palace.

Casually tossing Qin Ruoning and Bai Qianfeng onto the ground, in order not to let the latter breathe his last so quickly, he even cast a Rejuvenation Technique; under the infusion of vitality, the latter's severe wounds were rapidly stabilized and even recovered slightly.

Of course, such injuries would have long since killed any martial arts expert, but as a Golden Core Cultivator, Bai Qianfeng's body was tempered daily by Dharma Power and the spiritual machine of Heaven and Earth, possessing incomparably tenacious vitality; even with a broken body, as long as his brain was not destroyed, he could linger on for a long time.

Feeling the mending and repair of his wounds, the originally half-dead Bai Qianfeng regained some spirit and was even more horrified:

"Medical Dharma Technique? This is extremely rare even in the Upper Realm, how do you know it?"

Lu Yuan naturally would not answer the doubts in his heart, only saying indifferently:

"You talk too much."

The next moment, he ignored the two of them, immediately communicated with the Heavenly Book, sat cross-legged, and with a movement of his mind:

"Upgrade, Soul Absorption!"

Hum.

The next moment, the Heavenly Book in his mind bloomed with boundless light, and under the fierce burning of Luck Power, vast insights surged into his heart, causing Lu Yuan to fall into a strange state akin to an epiphany of the Dao.

【Divine Ability Master】: Lu Yuan

【Mastered Arts/Techniques】: -

Ingestion (Earth: 31%); - Guidance (Divine Communication: 9%); - Invisibility (Earth: 7%); -

Staff Sending (Divine Communication: 8%); - Medicine (Earth: 55%); - Earth Travel (Earth: 39%); -

Generating Light (Divine Communication: 11%); - Sword Technique (Divine Communication: 3%); - Boiling Stones (Earth: 47%); -

Pot Heaven (Earth: 64%); - Great Strength (Earth: 10%); - Sprouting Head (Divine Communication: 4%); -

Wind Control (Divine Communication: 7%); - Obstacle Clothing (Heaven: 3%); - Dream Grafting (Earth: 1%); -

Body Immobilization (Divine Communication: 3%); - Nightmare Prayer (Earth: 3%); - False Form (Earth: 1%): -

Cloning (Earth: 1%); - Soul Absorption (Earth: 1%); - Disaster Averting (Earth: 1%); -

Rain Prayer (Earth: 1%); - Stone Penetration (Human: 1%); - Array Formation (Divine Communication: 1%); -

Violent Sun (Earth: 1%).

Nine Breaths Serving Qi: (Divine Seed: 5%)

【Luck Power】: 75,241 units

Guidance, Staff Sending, Generating Light, Sword Technique, Sprouting Head, Wind Control, Body Immobilization.

After lighting up the Array Formation divine ability, the Luck he had accumulated over these nearly ten years had reached over one hundred thousand units; long ago during his seclusion, he had successively upgraded several of his main Earthly Fiend Arts to the Divine Communication stage, transforming them into true Earthly Fiend Divine Abilities.

Counting Array Formation and Nine Breaths Serving Qi, he had a full nine divine abilities on his person; dealing with Bai Qianfeng and Qin Ruoning, two cultivators whose cultivation levels were on par with his own, was naturally as easy as turning over one's hand, requiring no effort at all.

And now, what he was communicating with the Heavenly Book to upgrade was precisely the 【Soul Absorption】 that was about to be used on the two of them!

With others as the knife and chopping board and himself as the fish and meat, at this moment in the great hall, Qin Ruoning and Bai Qianfeng's faces were as pale as paper; although they did not understand what Lu Yuan was doing, they knew that what they were about to face was definitely not anything good, and both gritted their teeth, desperately circulating their Origin Cores and mobilizing their Dharma Power, wanting to break free from their predicament.

However, it was a pity that the light cones nailed into them were 'Array Flags' condensed by Lu Yuan using the Generating Light divine ability, and coupled with the Array Formation divine ability, their Qi Seas and Origin Cores were sealed tightly, making it impossible to mobilize even a shred of Dharma Power.

Just like this, after suffering for a full half-hour, the two had to dejectedly give up.

At the same time, Lu Yuan also suddenly opened his eyes, his gaze incomparably deep and profound.

Without a single word of nonsense, he suddenly reached out, and the broken-bodied Bai Qianfeng was instantly like withered branches and fallen leaves caught in a gale, falling into his hand at once, which also caused Bai Qianfeng to let out an incomparably terrified, shrill roar as if in a final flash of consciousness:

"Beast, what do you want to do, let—"

Before the words were finished, Lu Yuan's other hand pressed onto the top of his head, and immediately the 【Soul Absorption】 that had already been promoted to a divine ability was instantly activated!

Hum.

To absorb is to take.

Soul Absorption is both a method of taking a soul and a way to search a soul and seize a spirit, completely reading the memories within the soul; thus, when the Soul Absorption technique was activated, the severely wounded and dying Bai Qianfeng had no power to resist at all, immediately letting out a scream, then his eyes rolled back, and his body trembled violently.

"Soul Searching method? Fellow Daoist, please show mercy!"

Qin Ruoning, whose Dharma Power was sealed, cried out in horror, instinctively wanting to drag her broken-armed body forward to stop him, but at this moment a streak of sword light suddenly flew out from Lu Yuan's sleeve like lightning, hovering in front of her as if in warning.

The long, narrow sword light stopped in front of her like a living thing, the scorching radiance containing a peerless sharpness capable of severing everything in the world; Qin Ruoning bit her silver teeth, but in the end, she did not dare to step forward, and could only watch helplessly as Lu Yuan performed the Soul Searching method on Bai Qianfeng.

The oppressive atmosphere and the long wait lasted for a full hour or more.

The Soul Absorption technique is a method of forcibly searching another's memories, which is extremely painful for the subject; because Bai Qianfeng was too weak from his severe injuries, he only let out one or two screams at the very beginning, and subsequently, there was only the constant trembling of his body.

And when an hour had passed, the trembling reaction of his body also completely disappeared; when Lu Yuan released his hand, his incomplete corpse, eyes wide open and devoid of all breath, fell to the ground with a thud, clearly having had his soul scattered and dying with his eyes wide open in resentment.

Qin Ruoning's face was bloodless, a look of "the rabbit dies and the fox grieves" flashing in her eyes, while Lu Yuan frowned, still digesting the memory fragments obtained from Bai Qianfeng's soul.

A dilapidated immortal-cultivating city, overcast skies and dead energy blocking the sun, hideous-looking human corpses and beast corpses, blocking the sky and sun, an endless sea of corpses...

This massive amount of memory concerning the Upper Realm, which was completely inconsistent with his expectations, surged in Lu Yuan's heart, making his expression become extremely strange:

"What the hell..."

"This so-called Upper Realm is actually like an apocalypse, currently experiencing an immortal-cultivating version of Resident Evil?"