Chapter 256: Strength Enhancement

That same evening, the shamans of the various barbarian tribes in Yunzhou received word from their Ancestral Saints, ordering them to withdraw from the territory of Yunzhou immediately.

Even that barbarian saint who had intervened later understood that Lin Feng's words at the time were absolutely not just a threat.

Even if the other party did not strike personally, with a wave of his hand he could summon a terrifying army from the netherworld; facing this army, the barbarians had no chance of victory whatsoever!

Upon learning that tens of thousands of barbarian troops had been wiped out and that even an Ancestral Saint had been severely injured, the shamans of the various barbarian tribes were struck with terror.

Although they did not know the specific details of the battle, this result undoubtedly indicated just how powerful the enemy's strength was.

Consequently, that very night, a large number of barbarian tribes braved the wind and snow to begin leaving Yunzhou; regardless of whether they were willing or not, if they continued to stay, they would face total annihilation!

Of course, there were also some small tribes or tribes that had not received word from their Ancestral Saints that did not leave. In their haste, the large tribes could not spare any concern for them and could only leave them in Yunzhou to their own fates; perhaps they could even serve to delay the enemy for some time.

The relationships between the various barbarian tribes were never harmonious; instead, they were filled with oppression and competition at every moment, and the strong enslaving or even slaughtering the weak was simply a matter of course among the barbarians.

——————

In the graveyard deep within Xinglong Ridge, Lin Feng returned directly here after leaving Yunzhou.

He first took stock of the spoils from this engagement, then began to bury the corpses.

His greatest gains from this intervention were two things: one was the corpse of Wugemo, and the other was that severed half of the barbarian saint's body.

Wugemo's corpse could be buried directly, but Lin Feng intended to use the barbarian saint's body elsewhere.

"Clunk, clunk."

As he buried Wugemo's corpse, a new Calamity Ghost soon appeared within the Corpse-Planting and Ghost-Nurturing Scripture.

After finishing the account of the other party's life experiences, Lin Feng had gained a more comprehensive grasp of some important information from within the barbarian ranks.

The situation in the North was much as he had guessed; besides the White-Haired Wind, some special anomalies and inexplicable forbidden zones had appeared in that godforsaken place.

It was precisely these things that forced the barbarians to move south in full force, breaking through the Great Xia Dynasty and beginning to occupy places like Liangzhou and Yunzhou.

"That place really does have a problem, and those things are still spreading constantly. I fear it won't be many years before they spread to Great Xia..."

After reading this information, Lin Feng could not help but fall into deep thought; the problems of this world seemed to be becoming increasingly severe.

After digesting this information, Lin Feng immediately began to practice his martial arts. This battle had made him realize that those peerless martial arts were of immense help in combat.

This time, while fighting that barbarian saint, the Hun-Tian Qiu-Long had displayed extraordinary power. Once such a special martial art capable of leveraging the power of heaven and earth was mastered, every move would truly be infinitely powerful.

"Life-Death Great Handprint!"

As his internal energy circulated frantically, his arms were instantly covered by special patterns, and the heaven and earth Qi around him began to be mobilized.

"Hoo! Finally done!"

Feeling waves of surging power continuously emerging from his hands, Lin Feng reached out his palm and grabbed forward; instantly, a Dharma seal that appeared to flow with black and white colors gradually condensed and took shape beside him.

After being continuously impacted by his profound internal energy, this top-tier martial art had finally broken through the final barrier. Now, he could manipulate the life and death Qi within his body to condense all sorts of Dharma seals.

Some of these Dharma seals possessed terrifying destructive effects, some could withstand various attacks, and others possessed powerful healing properties... In short, the effects of this peerless martial art were extremely outstanding; it all depended on how the user employed them.

"Hoo~ hoo~"

As Lin Feng condensed one Dharma seal after another around his body, he gradually felt that his own strength had reached its limit.

"The final Life-Death Great Handprint still cannot be fully formed. It seems I must have my internal energy finally break through the limit and achieve the status of a Martial Dao Venerable before I can fully cultivate this martial art to Great Completion!"

The final Life-Death Great Handprint was composed of individual Dharma seals, also possessing the effect of leveraging heaven and earth Qi and triggering celestial phenomena.

It was just that Lin Feng could not yet fully condense all the Dharma seals that made up the Life-Death Great Handprint. According to his estimation, he still needed to continue accumulating internal energy; once he finally broke through the thousand-year limit and achieved the status of a Martial Dao Venerable, he should be able to cultivate this peerless martial art to Great Completion.

"The effect of using internal energy to temper my internal organs with the Imperial Golden Body Art is rapidly weakening. Next, I must obtain enough body-refining medicinal materials to continue improving. I wonder how Li Yanbing and King Mu are doing with their collection?"

"Should I have that Princess Qingyuan participate in collecting the relevant medicinal materials as well? Having one more faction means I can obtain more materials; after all, some aged medicinal materials are scarce goods."

After dissipating the Dharma seals surrounding him, Lin Feng began to ponder another matter.

Since he could only wait for his internal energy to increase to cultivate the Life-Death Great Handprint, he had to focus on this body-refining technique.

Currently, the Hun-Tian Qiu-Long Staff he mastered had formidable power, and his attack power was basically sufficient; the Life-Death Great Handprint had outstanding auxiliary effects, with no issues in combat, defense, healing, and so on; however, his most critical body-refining technique had not even reached Small Completion yet.

After thinking for a moment, Lin Feng moved his thoughts, and a string of blood-red characters immediately condensed inside the wooden hut where Princess Qingyuan lived on Mount Qianyuan.

The entire process was basically no trouble at all for Lin Feng; after all, the main reason the other party lived on Mount Qianyuan was the hope of being able to receive Lin Feng's instructions at any time.

Princess Qingyuan, who had been in her sleep, suddenly opened her eyes. After seeing the blood-red characters in the wooden hut clearly, she immediately bowed in the direction of the depths of Xinglong Ridge.

"I beg the Senior to rest assured, this junior will certainly find the required items as quickly as possible!"

Lin Feng could not help but shake his head at her reaction; this woman was quite clever. Once she saw clearly that the things Lin Feng needed were medicinal materials, she understood that Lin Feng needed them quite urgently.

"Hoo~ Next, I will continue to nurture ghosts. The Thousand-Faced Paper Ghost should be close to advancing!"

If there was anything that left Lin Feng dissatisfied with this battle against the barbarian saint, it was that the Thousand-Faced Paper Ghost's strength was too weak; the paper army basically could not play much of a role in battles between saints.

Although he was already carving a second, more powerful statue Dharma array, the Thousand-Faced Paper Ghost's insufficient base strength was ultimately a huge flaw.

"Click, click, click."

As Lin Feng opened the Ghost Gate, a large number of heavy-armored paper soldiers immediately walked out from the netherworld carrying a massive haul.

The large number of barbarian corpses, wolf-beasts, and other things previously harvested by the paper army were now, after simple sorting, all brought out as Lin Feng required.

A large number of barbarian corpses, including shamans, began to be piled up in the open space of the graveyard; the quantity and quality of these corpses were comparable to a mountain of corpses from the Corpse King Sect.

Besides this, there were quite a few barbarian soldiers captured by the paper army. Lin Feng did not have the paper army bring them into the graveyard, but instead left them directly in the netherworld.

Next, these people would serve as slaves to build the Ghost-Suppressing Tower or as sources for spirit-tasting hair; in any case, what awaited these brutal barbarians was certainly not a bright future.

Additionally, a large batch of wolf-beasts were forcibly subdued by the paper army and brought out obediently. For these wolf-beasts, Lin Feng would next have the Writing Ghost strike to alter their consciousness, then feed them Ghost-Blood Soup to create a large number of Ghost Wolf-Beasts for the paper army to use.

After dealing with these things, the paper army carried a large number of anomalies out from the military camp.

However, today's harvest was clearly not as good as yesterday's. Besides the reason that the Paper General's hunting range had not expanded much, another point was that the paper army had been pulled away by Lin Feng to fight in Yunzhou today, which had delayed quite a bit of time.

"Six Fierce Ghosts, thirteen Li Ghosts, thirty-seven Great Ghosts; that's alright, at least it's enough for today."

After a simple count of the number of ghosts, Lin Feng began to summon the ghosts in his hand to either sacrifice or offer to them.

This time, the Thousand-Faced Paper Ghost absorbed another twenty Great Ghosts, ten Li Ghosts, and five Fierce Ghosts, and its overall aura surged once again as a result.

According to Lin Feng's estimation, it would soon advance to become a Tribulation Ghost; it only needed to prepare more ghosts tomorrow as nourishment for its advancement.

Besides the Thousand-Faced Paper Ghost, the Twin Ghosts were also on the verge of advancing; it would not be long before they could advance to become Calamity Ghosts, and their overall strength would be improved once again.