Chapter 999

Actually, the most urgent thing right now is Tang Yaocao.

Looking at the situation at Yao Tian, Tang Yaocao's obsession has clearly become so deep that she herself can no longer control it.

On the contrary, Seven Halls Yama and Tang Xun are more composed when facing the final outcome.

Xiao Jiu now cannot be sure whether, even if they find a way to end Tang Yaocao, they could still save Seven Halls Yama.

But no matter what, things still need to be resolved step by step.

Xiao Jiu tapped his toes lightly, leapt up, and rushed straight to the girl's corpse at the center of the altar.

She hovered above the corpse, placed her right hand on the girl's crown, and mobilized her mana.

At the moment Xiao Jiu pulled the long needle deeply embedded in the crown out of the skull, Xiao Jiu seemed to hear a faint sigh.

Immediately after, with a crash, the girl's corpse collapsed to the ground and shattered into pieces.

The bones outside the altar circle also all shattered along with it.

Immediately after, the entire underground space began to shake uncontrollably.

This place will collapse soon.

By then, everything that has happened here will cease to exist.

Liu Junyan and Xiao Jiu quickly left.

What surprised them was that this crustal movement was more intense than they had imagined; in the following half hour, the village experienced a moderate earthquake, turning the village, which was already full of broken walls and ruins, into a wasteland.

During this process, the rumbling thunder went from far to near, and a heavy downpour arrived in an instant.

By then, Xiao Jiu and Liu Junyan had already left the village.

Hui Moqiong had already found out where the Buddhist shrine and the ancient painting had gone.

He said, the last person to have touched the Buddhist shrine and the ancient painting was probably the Seven Halls Yama.

For this result, Xiao Jiu and Liu Junyan were not too surprised.

"The Buddhist shrine and the ancient painting should now be in Hu Shan," Hui Moqiong speculated.

Xiao Jiu, however, disagreed: "To be precise, the Buddhist shrine and the ancient painting should both be in Lingdie Valley."

Hui Moqiong asked, "What should we do next? Have you decided?"

"No," Xiao Jiu said, "By the time we discovered all this, it was already too late; Tang Yaocao had already begun to develop toward demonization. If we could have acted earlier, when she had just awakened, we could have nipped this in the bud."

Unfortunately, there are no "ifs" in this world.

"The biggest difficulty lies in the special geographical location of that herb field," Liu Junyan said. "It is situated at the border between the Nether Realm and the Feng Clan, a sort of secluded utopia that belongs to no particular side."

In other words, it would be very difficult for Liu Junyan to forcibly break the space of the herb field by taking that route upward.

Likewise, the same applies to Xiao Jiu's side.

After careful consideration, Xiao Jiu finally made up her mind and said, "Since that's the case, we can only resort to forceful means to solve the problem."

Previously, Xiao Jiu had not used a large area of Nirvana fire to forcibly attack Lingdie Valley because she feared the Nirvana fire would destroy that herb field.

But now the situation is completely different.

Even if she didn't burn it, the spiritual qi of the entire herb field would be drained by Tang Yaocao.

What Tang Yaocao absorbs is not only the spiritual qi of the whole herb field, but also the life of the Seven Halls Yama!

Since that herb field is destined to be lost, Xiao Jiu felt there was no need to hold back any longer and should just launch a full-force attack.

This is the only way left.

But the consequences of doing so are uncontrollable.

The worst-case scenario would be... the entire army wiped out.

It would eliminate Tang Yaocao, while also destroying the Seven Halls Yama and Tang Xun.

Although Xiao Jiu put forward this idea, she herself had little confidence in it.

Liu Junyan understood her feelings at the moment and comforted her: "Xiao Jiu, I think we can give it a try; as for controlling the attack intensity, just leave that to me."

Xiao Jiu shook her head: "If the Nirvana fire really ignites, even if you can contain the range of the earth veins, you yourself will suffer serious injuries..."

"I can ask Xiong Feng for help," Liu Junyan reminded her. "I heard from A Cheng earlier that Xiong Feng has refined the Dust Pearl to a state of supernatural mastery; perhaps he can control the situation. I'll go talk to him."

Xiao Jiu thought about it and agreed.

They don't have much time left; now left; now any feasible plan, they must try.

Only by trying can there be a chance of success.

These days, Xiong Feng has also been keeping an eye on the situation over at Hu Shan.

From the moment he met Liu Junyan and Xiao Jiu on Cangwu Mountain, he has been wondering whether there is anything he can do to help.

So when Liu Junyan found Xiong Feng, Xiong Feng readily agreed: "If the Nirvana fire burns over a large area, I indeed lack the ability to control it, but I can use the power of the Dust Pearl to guide the Nirvana fire to change its direction of combustion. The herb field borders the Feng Clan and lies right next to Cangwu Mountain; at that time I will try to draw the Nirvana fire into Cangwu Mountain."

There is a Nirvana fire zone within Cangwu Mountain; if Xiong Feng can truly achieve what he said, the problem will be readily solved.

However, Xiong Feng did not boast; he also went to find Ao Jing, so that if he failed, Ao Jing could still guide Ice Sea water into Cangwu Mountain to control the situation.

Ao Jing, of course, had no hesitation, directly agreed, and began preparing.

Moved by everyone's generous assistance, when everything was ready, Xiao Jiu entered the herb field again, but she held back her attack.

She always felt that if she could still negotiate with Tang Yaocao, there would remain a sliver of hope.

She first released a symbolic amount of Nirvana fire to pressure Tang Yaocao; if the other party remained obstinate, she would have no choice but to take a risky approach.

This time Xiao Jiu entered the herb field still through the entrance of Cangwu Mountain.

But as Liu Junyan said, the entire herb field space is now filled with foul miasma; even ordinary people who find the entrance would find it hard to set foot inside at this time.

But Xiao Jiu is different.

She is the Earth Goddess, wielding the power of Mòyù Bānzhǐ and Five-Colored Earth.

The Five-Colored Earth is the soil of the state altars; with its power paving the way ahead, even if the herb field turned into a lump of iron, it could still make it bloom.

However, doing so consumes too much of Xiao Jiu's own energy; she can enter the herb field herself, but cannot bring others in.

Moreover, at this point it was also very difficult to get closer to Lingdie Valley again.

So after Xiao Jiu entered Yao Tian, she immediately held back, not wasting her strength to use the Mana of Five-Colored Earth to fill the pit in Yao Tian.

Xiao Jiu looked around; the entire Yao Tian was shrouded in black mist, making it impossible to see its original appearance.

However, Xiao Jiu quickly locked onto the direction of Lingdie Valley, summoned Feng Wu, drew her bow repeatedly, and shot out clumps of Nirvana fire, all at once rushing toward Lingdie Valley.

The direction of Lingdie Valley soon reacted, clumps of black qi condensed and met the Nirvana fire; upon impact, the black qi instantly ignited, and the Nirvana fire flared far away, setting the entire sky above Lingdie Valley ablaze……