Benefits and danger hand in hand

4 months later

Lin Fan was hiding within a certain cave. He cursed. 'That bastard Yan Fei. He really ordered all the disciples to target me!'

Lin Fan has been chased brutally in the last 4 months. Not only that, the woman he saved at the beginning, Li Meiying, also betrayed him at the most crucial moment giving a fatal blow to him. Lin Fan at this time is completely cornered, he also used up his Soul Powers, and is now powerless.

Other than few, especially those Rank 4s, nearly everyone has been targeting Lin Fan. He is currently healing himself. 

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At a certain location, a young man opened his eyes at this time.

'Finally Rank 4 early stage.'

Li Gang has been practicing Divine Serenity Technique and Arcane Soul Fusion Method continuously these days, every minute and every second. He even reduced his rest time for this.

Li Gang sighed. 'Now I can no longer improve, unless I enhance my Soul Power with some external method or find a way to increase my talent.'

He thought of something and his eyes turned sharp. "It's about time. The seed I have planted should have grown sufficiently. Now, I can harvest it."

He immediately changed his disguise and left the place. 

Soon he found a familiar young looking man. The young man looks seriously injured, and there were even companions near him. He immediately moved towards him and said. "Brother Ming! What happened?"

Ming Zhen is a Rank 3 peak stage Warrior. He looked at Li Gang and said. "Brother Li. He is too strong!"

Li Gang was surprised and asked. "Who? Lin Fan? Isn't he Rank 2?"

Ming Zhen shook his head and replied. "No, He is already Rank 3 peak stage. Even when we encircled him with 30 Warriors of Rank 3, he entered some extreme form and enhanced his strength multiple times. I felt it was more like a Soul Power, because it shook our Soul and some even suffered soul injury!"

Li Gang laughed inwardly but still maintained his composure on the outside. He looked at him deeply and asked. "Do you know where is he now?"

Ming Zhen took out the token and showed the area. He said. "He fled in this direction, when we encircled him. It's been 5 days now."

Li Gang nodded. "Don't worry, your contribution won't go to waste, I will definitely tell Senior brother Yan Fei about your deeds."

Ming Zhen immediately rejoiced. "Thank you brother."

It turns out, in the name of Yan Fei, Li Gang has already asked many Warriors to target Lin Fan. He was sure they can't kill him. A person who was Immortal won't die so easily. Even though he couldn't convince all of them, he was still able to convince at least 60 Warriors.

He asked for many other details and then went to the directed direction and thought. 'I am still not sure what trump card he possesses. But, now it is the only chance I will get.'

Li Gang reverted back his disguise and entered deep into the forest. 

He soon went at the top of a large tree and used his Wind-Thunder Eagle eye to look at different directions. 

His soul power has reverted back to Rank 4 early stage, but it's foundation has been solidified. It is so strong that it can rival an ordinary Rank 4 peak stage.

He thought. 'If I were in this position, what would be the first option I would have in my mind?'

He suddenly looked at the map and realized something. Li Gang laughed. "Interesting."

He found that near this place, there is a danger area marked here. And, if one passes this area, they can enter into a place which is surrounded by three other danger areas. 

'The most safest place is the most dangerous place!' completely justifies this situation.

He immediately moved and ran with his fastest speed while taking multiple detours and finally reached a certain location. Then he started looking at various places and soon found a cave. Without wasting a single moment, he entered the cave, but as he entered, he felt some formation triggered.

Lin Fan's laughing voice entered his ears. "You think it is that easy to get me?"

Li Gang face changed into a pitiful state, looked at Lin Fan and shouted. "Brother Lin, it's me."

Lin Fan heard the voice and immediately realized. "It's you! Are you also here to attack me?"

Li Gang immediately replied. "No, If I were with Yan Fei, why would I warn you before? I told you he might target you. But you didn't listen at all!"

Lin Fan was still suspicious. He asked. "How did you know I am here?"

Li Gang became excited and replied enthusiastically. "Of course because I am smart! When I got to know you escaped into this danger area, I immediately realized that you must have bypassed it to this place, which is the most dangerous place in the whole map. It is where 4 Dangerous area intersect and even Rank 5 beasts might be present!"

Lin Fan looked at him deeply and thought. 'This idiot is quite smart. He can be a good subordinate.'

Lin Fan nodded. He removed the formation and let Li Gang in. Soon they entered the cave, where Li Gang found an Alchemy pot was burning. 

He asked: "What are you making?"

Lin Fan replied. "I found a Silk Tulip by chance when I arrived here, a rank 6 Spiritual Plant. It is useful to refine Grade 6 Harmony Fusion Pills. My soul is injured in the previous battles. With this, I can heal them."

Li Gang's face changed. 'I can't let him have it, or else all my plans would be naught. It is good that I arrived in time. How can he be so lucky?'

Li Gang looked at him and asked. "Brother Lin, you truly are special. Not only your battle strength is high but you are even grade 6 alchemist! But how did you reach Rank 3 peak stage so fast?"

Lin Fan replied straightforwardly. "Don't ask what you shouldn't"

Li Gang immediately changed the topic to avoid embarrassment: "Should I help?"

But Lin Fan immediately rejected. "I can do it, you don't have to interfere."

1 hour later

The pill refinement process is now entering a crucial step. In this step, the refiner utilizes his soul power to carefully condense the medicinal essence to a pill. This require a huge mental power, which is nothing but Soul power itself.

Li Gang looked at him and laughed inwardly. 'About time.'

Lin Fan was wary of Li Gang, and used his soul to perceive what Li Gang was doing. Seeing him concentrating on pill furnace instead of him, he finally let down his guard. 

He started forming the pills. But, as soon as his Soul concentration was at the peak, Li Gang put his hand above Lin Fan's head and said softly. 

"Caught you!"

Lin Fan's face changed and at the same time, due to sudden change in concentration, the entire pill refinement process backfired on his soul, injuring him further.

Without giving him any chance. Li Gang used the Soul Search method without any hesitation.

Soon, hundreds of millions of years of memory started entering his mind. Li Gang's face changed. 

This pain is far beyond he can handle. It is unexplainable pain that brought utter despair to him.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

His eyes turned red and bloody tear fell from it. His brain nerves are visible from outside, and even started internal bleeding! He didn't even had the power to recite Arcane Soul Fusion Method! His consciousness turned blank and he immediately fainted.

At the same time, on top of a certain mountain in Sword Gate, an old man's eyes immediately opened.

Jiang Fugui immediately sensed the changes in his marks. He had marked Li Gang's soul itself, and as soon as his Soul suffered this much damage, his mark was also removed.

He sensed the location where it happened and immediately disappeared.

Soon, he appeared back before Li Gang. He looked at his situation and was shocked. There was another man lying here. Both were alive and both of their soul were heavily injured. 

What shocked him is that Lin Fan's soul is only Grade 5, and in an extremely injured state, but it's quality is way higher than even his own! As for Li Gang, his soul seems to have suffered some huge trauma. It was ruptured at many places.

'What actually happened here?'

He searched everywhere, but didn't find anything. He suddenly had a guess.

'It is more likely that he sneak attacked this young man, and this young man suffered backlash from the alchemy refinement, but he still survived and sacrificed his soul to launch a very powerful Soul attack. It should be some Secret Technique.'

In fact, even though his deductions are wrong, anyone in his place would have the same deductions because there is no clue at all.

He immediately took out a pill and placed it in Li Gang's mouth and this time marked both his body and soul.

As soon as the pill melted in Li Gang's mouth, his Soul started getting stabilized. It took 2 months for him to wake up from that state.

His temperament has a huge change after he woke up. He looked around and found Jiang Fugui not far away playing chess.

Li Gang stood up and went near him and bowed. "Thank you sect leader for saving my life. I would never forget this grace!"

Jiang Fugui nodded with satisfaction. "It's great that you have this idea. But get prepared, the Ethereal Sect entrance exam would start soon."

Li Gang nodded. "I won't disappoint you."

Jiang Fugui waved his hand and motioned him to leave now.

Li Gang immediately retreated. At the same time he thought about what happened before. 'I was too greedy, I have to be careful from now and learn from this mistake. I shouldn't put my life in danger for some benefits. I never expected the extent of danger from this soul search. This method was given to me by Wang Xueyao, I thought it was just a normal Soul Search method, but no this was a trap, as soon as I used this method, I couldn't even stop the Soul Search. It's good that I informed Jiang Fugui beforehand.'

Li Gang murmured. "I got a huge harvest but..."

He suddenly thought. 'Why does I only have his Cultivation life experiences and no information about this world? It's as if someone deliberately filtered what I should know and what I shouldn't. The information of this world can be deduced from those experiences easily, why would someone filter it then?'