Volume 4, Chapter 28 – Appointment

“Impossible…” Cui’er stared from the side, eyes wide. “We clearly hid our soul aura. How did you find this place?”

Ning Haiyun was mad, but not so stupid as to cause trouble right under Shenming’s main peak without any concealment prepared.

They had prepared. Both of them had cultivated a unique secret art learned from Immortal Venerable Ningyuan that could conceal their soul aura and naturally cut off all targeted probing intent.

As long as this secret art was kept running, even if the two of them swaggered down the street in broad daylight instead of hiding in a room, in theory, anyone who saw them would only take them for unrelated passersby, not even bothering to focus their gaze.

“You two seem to have done some work on the path of soul,” Bai Xiang’s tone lifted slightly as she looked at Cui’er with a touch of curiosity, “is that because of Immortal Venerable Ningyuan?”

“…Yes!” Cui’er looked at Bai Xiang, then at Ning Haiyun, who was currently collapsed on the ground in a soul-less daze. Gritting her teeth, she mustered her courage. “My lady has offended your dojo, that is indeed her fault. But I beg you to spare her this once, for the Venerable’s sake!”

“Spare her?”

As soon as she said it, Cui’er saw Bai Xiang step out of the shadows and come forward, fully revealing a flawless face.

What… what kind of face was this?

At first glance it was simply pretty, beautiful.

Yet when Cui’er could not help taking a second look, a third look, her gaze was unknowingly drawn in, as if pulled by a magnet and fixed to that face. She could not stop staring into those strange golden eyes. Her whole body began to tremble.

What… what is this…

Even the stupefied Ning Haiyun was affected. Mistress and maid fell together into the nebula vortex that the golden eyes became, plummeting and plunging through endless cosmic void, their bodies and consciousness passing through star clusters, constantly tasting just how insignificant they were.

In that process, the two of them stood frozen like idiots under a spell, unable to move. Not until Bai Xiang walked right up to them and reached out to tap each of them between the brows did they still fail to resist in the slightest, unable even to blink.

Without any resistance, Bai Xiang seized their “true spirits,” just as she had controlled the Black Crystal Venerable back then, and pinned them in place.

Clenching the two pinpricks of white light that were their true spirits, Bai Xiang saw the white jade vial lying by their side, drew it into her hand, and stored the true spirits within.

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This time, the proportion of true spirit she took was far larger than with the Black Crystal Venerable. The two of them were now completely reduced to puppets under her control. Whatever Bai Xiang wanted them to do, they could not resist.

It was done.

Confirming that neither of them had had time to trigger any self-destruct type soul secret arts, Bai Xiang finally relaxed. She could not help sighing at how useful these cursed eyes were.

She had actually run tests before, checking the limits of her Silent Domain, that is, the transformed sword move “Empty-Thought Shenming,” to see just how far its so-called “silencing” and “interrupting” effect went.

The experiment had shown that this sealing mostly targeted a person’s cultivation.

What did that mean?

Sword Dao cultivation, Path of Qi cultivation, Dao-Void Method cultivation, these all belonged to the same class. In Daoist terms, they were all within the category of “refining qi.”

As long as cultivation in that area was suppressed by Bai Xiang, then under the oscillations of Empty-Thought Shenming, there would be no getting up again. Whether normal arts, secret arts, or divine abilities, everything would be sealed, leaving the target helpless.

This sealing interfered most with refining-qi cultivation, less with the soul, and least with the physical body.

That was why Wu Qing and the others had been able to survive the Thunder-Sea Tribulation Lotus. Their attainments on the path of body refinement were not low either. Most of them had opened their essence-qi apertures, their blood and essence honed to a fine edge, barely able to withstand the pounding of the thunder cudgels.

Likewise, because the interference with the soul was not thorough enough, the Seven Illusory Heavens Alliance people could rely on soul secret arts to block soul-searching.

After discovering these flaws, Bai Xiang had been thinking about how to patch these two weak points.

She already had an idea for dealing with the body. Since the move’s principle was to manipulate and draw on the energy of heaven and earth to create resonance, then as long as the vibration reached a certain intensity, it would naturally affect the bones and flesh of any bodies within its range.

It was just like beasts and venomous insects that normally hunted with ferocity. Never mind cultivators. Even a strong, experienced hunter, gripping a beast by the neck or pinching a venomous insect by the tail, only had to give a single sharp shake. A clever force would run along the spine like a main ridge, leaving the creature unable to exert a single ounce of strength, collapsing limp and ready to be bound.

The principle was the same here. The difference was that to make vibrations “strong enough to interfere with a cultivator’s body” out of thin air would be especially difficult.

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With Bai Xiang’s current cultivation, she could not yet do it, but at least she had found a direction.

As for how to target souls, she truly had no ideas.

Soul-abilities were powerful, but limited to inside her own body.

With no way to extend them outward, she had turned instead to the Xuan Emperor Scripture, and from there, to the “Golden-Eyed Illusory God” she had once used.

Opening the Hidden Spirit Orifice had pushed Bai Xiang’s soul and mind through another metamorphosis. From then on, the soul fused together with her other two flowers, and this was in fact a qualitative change for the Golden-Eyed Illusory God as well.

You could think of it this way. The original Golden-Eyed Illusory God did not just fail to draw on soul-abilities, it could only be maintained and powered by soul force and mental force.

Now, though, the Golden-Eyed Illusory God also drew on Bai Xiang’s Path of Qi cultivation, and even on her blood and body cultivation.

It had gone from only draining the “blue bar” to draining blue bar, health bar, and action bar together. If that was not a complete qualitative shift, what was?

Back when she had not thought of it, these eyes had been subconsciously set aside. At most, the people around her just felt her aura of authority deepen, her presence like an unfathomable abyss.

They only assumed that came from her growing cultivation and the bonus of her high position.

But once she really thought of it and began to mobilize these eyes, she immediately found that suppressing small fry like this was as easy as drinking water.

Not bad at all.

She lined Ning Haiyun and Cui’er up and had them go through a few sets of radio calisthenics. Bai Xiang was thoroughly satisfied with the results.

The “server” had tried to patch the bug in her soul-reading, and she had personally hacked it back in.

She had always felt the Golden-Eyed Illusory God was a bit off, as if using this ability was admitting she was not purely human. That was why she had shelved it after her breakthrough.

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Looking at it now, why bother worrying so much.

With soul-abilities sitting in the middle to keep everything under control, nothing inside her would be able to stir up any waves no matter what it was.

This time really was a case of “so fragrant after all.” Bai Xiang, like someone who had gotten a new toy, experimented several more times with this power in curiosity.

She soon discovered that the mortals in the corridor, those who had been polluted by the “Brain-Eater” Demon Pool, only needed a light sweep of her gaze infused with soul force. The polluted components would then turn into wisps of black qi that rose out of their crowns and silently dispersed back into heaven and earth.

And whether it was an illusion or not, each time a wisp of black qi dissipated, her eyes seemed to grow a trace more comfortable, as if just the slightest bit of something was being replenished.

But it was too little.

So little that it was almost nothing. If not for her soul-abilities and the monitoring of Jade Spirit, that bit of replenishment would have been impossible to detect.

What did that mean?

The eyes inherited from the Xuan Emperor, did their innate abilities include devouring souls as well?

Demon Pools were formed from masterless soul energy that had been gathered under interference from the Void Tribulation.

Bai Xiang frowned. She had a feeling that what she was absorbing was not limited to scattered soul energy, but might also include the “power of Loss of Order” that the Dao-Void Methods prized most.

It counted as a new discovery.

After clearing the pollution off these people, Bai Xiang bundled up Ning and Cui and flew back to the mountain gate of the dojo.

She waited there a while, and soon another figure drifted in out of the sky. It was her master Xiang Xian, hauling down a Daoist who had been beaten like a dead dog, tossing him to the ground just as Bai Xiang had.

This was nothing more than an expected interlude. The two of them did not pay it much mind. After notifying Hu Hu and the other disciples to come and secure the prisoner, Bai Xiang sat down to another game of Go with Xiang Xian while they discussed how to promote their business.

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“Your method is very effective,” Xiang Xian admitted.

“Free nationwide shipping, that means we cover the freight, right? It really has made the order volume explode, several times what it used to be.”

It was just that the manpower was hard-pressed to keep up.

Xiang Xian grumbled inwardly.

Yuming Workshop did not follow the route of mechanized production. Every sword it produced was forged by a craftsman’s hand.

With demand skyrocketing like this, even if they did not count the cost of labor, there was no way to finish all the work in a short time.

“This is the most important matter within the Dao right now,” Bai Xiang said with a smile. “I will have to trouble Master.”

“When this is over, I should pay a formal apology to my senior brothers as well. This time truly has been hard work for everyone.”

She was talking about those veteran disciples who had followed Xiang Xian, come to settle on Yuming Peak as part of the Yuming Sword Dao.

“Saying polite things like that to me?” Xiang Xian scolded her with a laugh, yet in her heart she was very pleased with Bai Xiang’s actions.

Her disciple had already surpassed her, yet still respected her master so deeply.

That kind of character was exceedingly rare in this age when rites and propriety had all but collapsed.

After a few more casual remarks, Xiang Xian suddenly remembered something.

“Oh, right.” She flicked another glance at Bai Xiang’s face and forced down a strange feeling as she said, “Governor Zhang had someone bring a message today.”

“He says there is a senior brother who wants to meet you.”