Chapter 18: Golden Core vs. Golden Core

After walking five or six miles with Ling Qingshu, Xu Yang suddenly halted.

He looked around into the silent, dark night; the stillness was unsettling.

Ling Qingshu also stopped, sensing something was wrong—it was far too quiet here.

"Who's there? Show yourself," she demanded.

With those words, Ling Qingshu drew her sword and looked toward a shadowy direction in the darkness.

"Little girl, hand over all your magical artifacts, elixirs, and whatever you bought at the auction, and I might let you live another day."

An elderly man in a black robe emerged from the darkness and lunged forward as soon as he spoke.

Since sensing something was wrong, Ling Qingshu had been on her guard.

As the black-robed elder charged toward her, she raised her sword defensively across her chest.

When he got close, she struck with a swift thrust aimed directly at his throat.

The black-robed elder wasn't about to let her succeed so easily; he quickly formed a hand seal, and a shimmering golden shield appeared in front of him.

When the golden shield met Ling Qingshu's sword, it shattered instantly, but the elder had already closed the distance.

He formed another seal, and a massive serpent materialized behind him, its jaws opening wide as it lunged toward Ling Qingshu.

Whether intentionally or not, the black-robed elder ignored Xu Yang, who was merely watching the battle from the sidelines, with only the aura of a Qi Refining practitioner.

In the elder's eyes, Xu Yang, at the Qi Refining level, posed no threat.

Xu Yang, meanwhile, simply stood quietly, showing no intention of intervening in their duel.

He had already noticed this black-robed elder following them.

Back at the Spirit Treasure Auction House, it was this same elder who had competed with Ling Qingshu for the divine egg of the Cloud Beast.

After the auction ended, he had tailed Xu Yang and Ling Qingshu, waiting for an opportunity to ambush them.

The lure of quick wealth is common in the cultivation world, just as it is elsewhere.

Desperate and driven by greed, the black-robed elder was drawn to the divine egg that Xu Yang and Ling Qingshu had won at the auction.

The elder had once come across brief mentions of such divine eggs in the records of his sect, and he was very tempted by their mystical qualities.

Moreover, his sect's secret techniques contained a method to absorb the divine essence of such eggs for personal gain.

Given all these factors, the black-robed elder chose to follow and ambush the two.

Xu Yang, however, was unfazed by being tailed by a Golden Core cultivator; if the elder crossed a line, Xu Yang would simply dispatch him with a wave of his hand.

"Girl, you're only a newly advanced Golden Core cultivator, yet you've held your own against me this long. Your sect's teachings must be quite impressive."

"If you hand over your cultivation techniques, I'll spare the life of that pretty boy behind you."

Although he was battling Ling Qingshu, the black-robed elder found himself unable to overpower her and even sensed the constant risk of being defeated.

Although the possibility was slim, the black-robed elder remained cautious, his thoughts turning toward Ling Qingshu's cultivation technique.

"If you want my technique, let's see if you have the skill to take it," Ling Qingshu said.

With a swift motion, she ran her fingers along the blade of her sword, and a fierce aura erupted from her.

As she swung her sword again, each strike was accompanied by a powerful surge of sword qi.

The black-robed elder summoned a small seal, which grew to the size of a cauldron in mid-air. It blocked the sword qi from Ling Qingshu, then came crashing down toward her.

As Ling Qingshu's attacks became more relentless, the black-robed elder no longer focused on obtaining her technique. Instead, his thoughts were now solely on eliminating her and then dealing with the young man who was watching from the sidelines, finishing his murderous plunder.

Ling Qingshu was somewhat at a disadvantage in defending against the elder's attacks, but as their battle continued, she grew more adept at using the golden core's energy within her, performing with increasing ease.

The giant serpent circled around Ling Qingshu, occasionally lunging at her with its vicious jaws.

The black-robed elder held the small seal, waiting for an opening. The moment Ling Qingshu made a mistake, he intended to strike for a fatal blow.

Xu Yang watched the battle from the side. Although the clash appeared somewhat clumsy to him, he was still impressed with Ling Qingshu's performance.

After continuous exchanges, she had shown the ability to improve, which was a solid indication of her talent. In her past sect, Tianlan Sect, she would have been considered above average in terms of potential.

"Die, little girl!" the elder snarled.

After waiting so long, the black-robed elder finally spotted an opening in Ling Qingshu's defense and threw the small seal at her.

Ling Qingshu hastily raised her sword to block, but was forced to retreat.

The black-robed elder planned to follow up with another attack, once again hurling the small seal toward her.

Ling Qingshu flew backward, trying to raise her sword to deflect the incoming seal, but she was too slow.

A wicked smile spread across the black-robed elder's face as he thought to himself that in the next moment, his treasure would turn Ling Qingshu into pulp.

"Die, little girl!" he shouted again.

But in the next second, he froze in shock as a figure appeared in front of Ling Qingshu.

It was the Qi Refining practitioner, the very one he had been disregarding. To his disbelief, the Qi Refining cultivator had suddenly appeared in front of Ling Qingshu.

In the Qi Refining cultivator's hand was his own small seal, the very treasure he had been using.

The black-robed elder's eyes widened in disbelief as he stared at Xu Yang.

"Not bad. For a late-stage Golden Core, this is already impressive," Xu Yang casually said, tossing the small seal aside before vanishing in an instant.

The next moment, Xu Yang appeared right beside the black-robed elder.

The giant serpent sensed Xu Yang's presence and lunged at him with its massive mouth open.

Xu Yang barely paid it any attention. He simply raised a hand slightly.

In an instant, the black serpent was caught in Xu Yang's grasp, an ability that had once been extremely famous in the Tianlan Sect thousands of years ago.

There had once been someone who ascended from the Tianlan Sect and could use this ability to pluck the stars and moons from the sky, control phoenixes, and capture dragons.

Though Xu Yang's power with this technique was not at the terrifying level of those legends, controlling ordinary magical treasures and techniques was still easy for him.

With a single squeeze, the giant serpent in Xu Yang's hand turned into a cloud of black smoke and vanished.

"If you want to kill and plunder, you should first consider who you are," Xu Yang said as he made another move.

The black-robed elder felt his Golden Core within him destabilize, as if it was about to burst out of his body.

"How is this possible?" the black-robed elder gasped in shock. He had never heard of a technique that could influence the Golden Core like this before.

"I'll grant you the death of your Golden Core leaving your body," Xu Yang said, his fingers curling into claws.

The black-robed elder, unable to suppress his Golden Core any longer, felt it burst free from his body and fall into Xu Yang's hand.

With the Golden Core forcibly taken from him, the black-robed elder's life force dissipated.

Meanwhile, the Yun Beast standing on Xu Yang's shoulder swallowed the Golden Core, letting out a puff of mist as if it had just finished a meal.