Chapter 235 (Part 1): Elemental Life

After leaving a base point on the Secret Realm, Hua Jian used it as a starting point to begin expanding her influence.

At this time, if someone could stand high in the Secret Realm and observe its sky, on close inspection they would discover tiny cracks appearing one after another in the sky.

These cracks were not large now, but their expansion speed within the Secret Realm was not slow.

As the cracks expanded, snow-white little furballs also drifted down from the sky, blending harmoniously into the flying snow and drifting toward every part of the Secret Realm.

These snow-white little rabbits opened their eyes in the air, looked at the frozen land below, and sought an area worth paying attention to.

But the world in the little rabbits’ eyes was only a vast whiteness; they could not even see a speck of another color, as if this pure white land had always been this way, with not a single foreign thing ever having entered.

Then, what about those cultivators who had lost contact?

Where exactly had they gone?

Hua Jian’s gaze turned toward the distant vortex of dark clouds. The answer she sought might lie in that direction.

……

“Still can’t contact the outside? Damn it!”

“No contact. The Spiritual Power in this space is too murky and chaotic. The messages we send simply cannot get out.”

Tucking the dim Yupai that showed no reaction at all into his clothes, the male cultivator in a Wanling Sect uniform turned his gaze toward several cultivators sitting not far away.

Those cultivators looked somewhat awkward. Surrounded by Wanling Sect cultivators, they sat quite obediently.

The style of their clothes was common in Beijing, but Wanling Sect would not mistake their identities.

In an accidental encounter not long ago, these people had used the signature Spiritual Power of Tiandao Sect.

Now it really was like fellow townsmen meeting, both sides in tears.

At least the Tiandao Sect cultivators were tearfully begging the Wanling Sect cultivators not to hit their faces.

Fortunately, the Wanling Sect cultivators also knew Tiandao Sect counted as friendly at this time. After recognizing their identities, they absorbed them into the group.

Now that trouble had struck, meeting people from Tiandao Sect was already an unexpected joy. It was better than running into Magic Path people, who were like enemies.

“What about you? Do you have any ideas?” the male cultivator leading the Wanling Sect group shouted toward those Tiandao Sect cultivators.

“My dear brothers, if we had ideas, would we still be sitting here as captives?” The Tiandao Sect Ling Emperor cultivator sighed. They had been sent by Tiandao Sect to scavenge and pick up scraps.

Even the well-prepared Wanling Sect group was powerless against the current situation. How could they possibly have a way?

“I remember what we’re supposed to do after losing contact…… right, when a Secret Realm has information-blocking ability, we need to seek help from Wanling Sect. Our teachers taught us this.”

The Tiandao Sect Ling Emperor’s eyes drifted guiltily.

But that was said for cultivators outside the Secret Realm.

If one was inside the Secret Realm, then one could only take it one step at a time.

Strive to stay alive and wait for people outside to send support in.

“So many days have passed. The outside surely has discovered we lost contact. Now all we can do is hold fast and wait for rescue.”

The Wanling Sect Ling Emperor sighed again.

Tiandao Sect people really could not be relied on.

Now all they could hope for was that the outside would send support into the Secret Realm as soon as possible.

“So conservative. Haven’t you thought about just going to pick that Spiritual Flower? Maybe once it’s picked, the interference in the Secret Realm will disappear?”

That sentence made the Wanling Sect Ling Emperor roll his eyes.

Of course he had thought about it, but the current situation clearly did not allow such a decision.

Why had they camped here?

Wasn’t it because the area further ahead was sealed by snowstorms, and once they went deep, they would face enormous threats and obstacles?

That Heavenly Nether Snow Lotus was not weak. Its strength had at least reached Imperial-grade.

Add its control over the Secret Realm, and for several Ling Emperors like them to force their way in and seize the Treasure, the difficulty was comparable to ascending to heaven.

What was even more terrifying and bizarre was that since entering this Secret Realm, they had not encountered even one Spirit Beast, nor any living being capable of movement.

A Secret Realm could grow a Heavenly Nether Snow Lotus, but not Spirit Beasts? How was that possible!

Then where could these Spirit Beasts be?

The answer was right in the open. Of course they had gone to serve as Protectors beside You Xue Lian.

If they went deep into the snowstorm to pick You Xue Lian, they would not only face You Xue Lian’s counterattack but also have to deal with an unknown number of terrifying Spirit Beasts.

The risk was truly too great. The Wanling Sect Ling Emperor did not dare make such a risky choice.

“The snowstorm here is still spreading. Since you plan to be conservative, then I think we may be better off moving a little farther away.” The Tiandao Sect Ling Emperor gave a fair suggestion.

Camping in this place left them neither here nor there. The bold had gone forward to attack the Secret Realm’s core and fight for Treasures, while the timid had hurried out to the Secret Realm’s periphery to do odd jobs.

Staying here, neither advancing nor retreating, taking area damage from the Secret Realm’s Core Zone while doing nothing at all, was truly very stupid.

“Here we can react more quickly to sudden situations,” the Wanling Sect Ling Emperor retorted. “But…… we can indeed retreat a bit.”

He had stayed here for several days and could clearly feel the storm’s intensity increasing.

Since they had decided not to advance rashly, then they should retreat to a safer area.

“That’s right…… wait, no, something’s coming!”

The Tiandao Sect Ling Emperor had just wanted to praise the Wanling Sect Ling Emperor when the snowstorm around them suddenly changed, becoming even sharper.

A tall, pitch-black figure gradually became clear from the blizzard.

It was a giant white bear several stories tall, and the aura it gave off made the weaker Tiandao Sect and Wanling Sect cultivators tremble uncontrollably.

Linghuang Jing!

And a very powerful Linghuang Jing!

“Everyone retreat immediately. Hey, Tiandao Sect, come with me and stop this thing!”

The Wanling Sect Ling Emperor’s brows twisted completely together.

This kind of big fellow was not an opponent one or two Ling Emperors could handle.

Including him, there were two Wanling Sect Ling Emperors who had entered the Secret Realm, plus this one from Tiandao Sect.

Even with four people attacking together, he did not think they could defeat this ill-intentioned giant bear.

The reason was simple. This was the opponent’s home ground.

The four of them would be weakened to varying degrees here, and the strength they could display was not what it once was.

“Understood. You all retreat with the Wanling Sect people. This Secret Realm definitely has something wrong with it!”

The Tiandao Sect Ling Emperor leaped up, jumped to the Wanling Sect Ling Emperor’s side, and took a Spirit Tool from his Storage Pouch to activate it.

Although Tiandao Sect’s reputation had always been poor, he was at least a Ling Emperor.

In a real fight, he would not be much weaker than Ling Emperors from Other Sects, okay!

……

Sparkling, transparent like crystal, crunching like ice cubes when chewed……

The plants in this Secret Realm really were strange.

The Spirit Beasts in this Secret Realm could not possibly grow bigger by eating this kind of thing, right?

On the vast Ice Plain, a furry Snow Crystal Rabbit was lowering its head to nibble something that could not be noticed at all from the sky.

This was a native plant of this Secret Realm…… if it could really be considered a plant.

Its appearance was actually somewhat similar to the Ice Lotus that Hua Jian cultivated, but the ice content of these plants was much higher than that of Ice Lotus.

It could even be said that these plants were fundamentally formed from ice.

Hua Jian had also eaten the Petals of the Ice Lotus she cultivated. .

Although they were a bit cold, she could still feel that breath of life when eating them.

But these Ice Crystal Grass leaves were different.

Eating them really was like eating ice cubes.

But if you said they were not plants, then why did they grow in the shape of grass leaves?

It could not be because they thought it was fun, right?

Such little Ice Crystal Grass was everywhere in this Secret Realm.

Everywhere the little white rabbits Hua Jian sent out arrived, they could discover traces of this grass.

This was good news. At least her little rabbits did not need to worry about starving to death…… well, actually, they never needed to worry about starving to death in the first place.

Snow Crystal Rabbits could literally survive by drinking the northwest wind.

While the cultivators in the Secret Realm struggled to survive in the blizzard, little white rabbits were descending from the sky one after another, beginning to open up their Territory and carrying Hua Jian’s gaze to every part of the Secret Realm.

In just one day, Hua Jian had already spread out hundreds upon thousands of Snow Crystal Rabbits.

Most of them she simply dropped and ignored, planning to connect to them later when she remembered.

Meanwhile, the Wanhuagu cultivators left outside the Secret Realm had now completely become a rabbit-catching brigade, grabbing Snow Crystal Rabbits all over the Ice Plain to replenish Hua Jian’s consumption.

But as Hua Jian’s influence expanded, these little rabbits were truly not enough.

Hua Jian could only reduce the number of Snow Crystal Rabbits deployed per unit area and focus her attention on more important places.

According to her estimate, if she wanted to wrap the entire Secret Realm with her root system, it would take a full half year, and to completely devour the Secret Realm, it would take twice as long.

She clearly did not have that much time. Fortunately, her goal was only to extend her sphere of influence toward the Secret Realm’s Core Region as much as possible. That would not take as much time.

Hua Jian felt she could complete this Mission within a month.

Do not think a month is long. This Secret Realm was absurdly huge to begin with.

Even if you made a Ling King run straight without stopping, it would take ten days to half a month to cross it.

To put it bluntly, several Secret Realms combined might be larger than the current cultivation world’s Beijing.

Compared with the vast sea of Secret Realms, today’s cultivation world held no advantage at all in area.

Those oversized Secret Realms could even be larger than the Sacred Domain, but because their laws were incomplete and they could not birth powerful native life, they were called Secret Realms.

Otherwise, it would be hard to say who deserved to be called a Secret Realm.

Everyone was a world formed after the ancient cultivation world shattered. Who was nobler than whom?

“Huh? What is that over there?” While Hua Jian was letting her thoughts wander, she suddenly noticed a different color appear on the vast white snowfield.

A black stain had appeared amid the boundless white.

It was undoubtedly very conspicuous.

Hua Jian did not even think before tossing a Snow Crystal Rabbit down.

After the little rabbit successfully made a hard landing on the ground, Hua Jian directly took over the little creature’s body and began observing the black mark that had caught her attention firsthand.

Mm, it really was a person, but a dead one.

It was a cultivator in black clothes with an expression of extreme terror.

Because he was already dead, Hua Jian could not temporarily determine his strength in life.

But a Ling Emperor would not die silently in a place like this.

This cultivator was probably only a Spirit Master or a low-rank Ling King.

Manipulating the Snow Crystal Rabbit to hop twice on the cultivator’s already stiff body, Hua Jian found that there were no external wounds on him.

He had frozen to death within a short time.

Before death, he seemed to have seen something, and his expression was abnormally horrified.

“He wanted to run but couldn’t get away? What attacked him here…… ah!”

While Hua Jian was pondering, she suddenly felt her body turn cold.

Before she could react to what had happened, she found that she had lost control of the Snow Crystal Rabbit’s body.

That little white rabbit had been killed?

Hua Jian was stunned. Had she really not noticed that something was watching her from the dark?

But it did not matter if the Snow Crystal Rabbit was killed.

The Vines Hua Jian had left in the Snow Crystal Rabbit’s body to control it had not yet lost their vitality.

These Vines began absorbing the Snow Crystal Rabbit’s Flesh-and-Blood, rapidly differentiating sensory organs and bringing Hua Jian the scene around the Snow Crystal Rabbit.

And Hua Jian finally saw the Snow Crystal Rabbit’s current state. The little rabbit seemed to have been instantly wrapped by something of extremely low temperature, and its entire body had been frozen.

Although Snow Crystal Rabbits had cold resistance, they were still helpless against such low temperatures and could only end up quick-frozen into an ice sculpture.

Yet the culprit who caused all this was still nowhere to be seen, until Hua Jian changed her method of observation.

After replacing normal vision with Spiritual Power Vision, Hua Jian finally saw clearly the culprit who had killed the cultivator and the Snow Crystal Rabbit.

It was a cloud-and-mist-like mass of extremely cold Spiritual Power.

Without observing it with Spiritual Power Vision, it really would be hard to distinguish it from the snowfield.

But this mass of Spiritual Power was not something naturally formed.

Hua Jian felt it should possess a certain degree of intelligence, or rather…… consciousness.

Because the Snow Crystal Rabbit had been attacked, this mass of Spiritual Power’s target was very clear.

It was the Snow Crystal Rabbit she had dropped to observe the cultivator.

It could not be that her luck was really so good that she happened to block this mass of Spiritual Power’s path forward, right?

Then her luck would be so good it was a bit too exaggerated.

Verifying this guess was also very simple.

Just drop another Snow Crystal Rabbit and see whether this mass of Spiritual Power would target the new Snow Crystal Rabbit.

No sooner said than done.

Hua Jian dropped a new little rabbit from the sky and let the little creature move freely on the snowfield, while she hid within the already frozen Snow Crystal Rabbit’s body and quietly observed the situation.

Soon, she discovered that after the Snow Crystal Rabbit approached this mass of Spiritual Power by about a thousand meters, the originally lazy and scattered Spiritual Power suddenly seemed to be injected with chicken blood, howling as it pounced toward the unaware Snow Crystal Rabbit.

Just a few seconds later, the little white rabbit Hua Jian had newly dropped was caught fully by this mass of Spiritual Power and completely lost its life under the low temperature.

“Looks like this unlucky fellow saw this mass of Spiritual Power and wanted to run, but in the end couldn’t get away……”

To Hua Jian, this counted as good news.

Although the first person she found was a dead man, she had found the culprit who killed this cultivator and confirmed the other party’s identity.

This meant that this Secret Realm did not contain that kind of highly bizarre Rule.

This place was only dangerous, not so eerie that it left people with no room to fight back.

If it were the situation over at the Illusory Dream Flower Secret Realm, what you would see was a group of people collapsed on the ground for unknown reasons, and you could rack your brains without ever guessing that their Soulforce was currently in another place holding a great meeting.