Infiltrating the Iron Fortress

Ji Ning and the others were watching the distant mountain range that stretched as far as the eye could see. Even though they hadn’t entered yet, each of them could sense the surging, oppressive pressure being released from the mountains—the pressure of the grand formation protecting the headquarters.

“Senior apprentice-brother, how do we get in?” Mu Northson sent frantically.

Xiaoqing muttered quietly, “Countless mortals, over a million cultivators… over endless years in a lair like this, who knows how many formations and prohibitions there are! Generations of Celestial Immortals from the Youngflame clan all went to great lengths to set them up. A lair like this is basically a single solid chunk of iron! How do we break in? How do we do it?” She glanced sideways at Ji Ning.

“Senior apprentice-brother…” Mu Northson was also looking at Ji Ning.

Confronted with a lair like this, they had no way at all.

It was too heavily fortified!

It was far more impenetrable than the Donglin Mountain range. Although this was only one of the Youngflame clan’s three ancestral lairs, it already surpassed the Beishan clan of Anchan! From the Primordial Fiendgod Era to the present, the Youngflame clan had produced more than a few Celestial Immortals. The ancestral lair of such a tribe… in terms of danger, it was probably comparable to Mount Innerheart’s formation protecting Mount Yan!

“Of course a head-on assault won’t work,” Ji Ning shook his head. “Layer upon layer of formations. If we try to force our way in, we’ll be trapped immediately.” When the Bloodcloud Hall had tried to assassinate him, he had been trapped in the Donglin Mountain formations and had barely escaped thanks to a Greater Teleportation Dao-talisman.

“Then what do we do?” Mu Northson pressed.

“Forget how I got into the forbidden zone?” Ji Ning glanced at Mu Northson.

Mu Northson was stunned.

“I’ll use the same method to infiltrate the Chenyu Mountains,” Ji Ning said with a smile. In all the Three Realms, cultivators of the Eight-Nine Arcane Art were the most mysterious and unpredictable. Some Immortal estates, the Heavenly Court, the Netherworld Kingdom… relying on the Eight-Nine Arcane Art, one could enter them all with ease.

A single hour later.

Inside the mobile Immortal estate.

“Spare me, senior, spare me! If I, Youngflame Lu Shao, have offended you in any way, please let me know!” A tall, thin, middle-aged man was staring in terror at the masked black-robed figure in front of him. He didn’t have the slightest thought of resisting, because the black-robed man was far too powerful.

Just now, he had been inside the city, but the opponent had appeared out of nowhere and had completely suppressed him with his mere ‘Domain of the Dao’, then sucked him into the mobile Immortal estate.

If a Domain of the Dao alone could have such power… one thought from the opponent would be enough to kill him, Youngflame Lu Shao.

“If I wanted to kill you, you would have died long ago,” the masked black-robed man said, his voice hoarse.

Youngflame Lu Shao was secretly relieved. If this mysterious being had killed him on sight, that would have been far too unjust. He immediately said, “If you have any orders, senior, please instruct me. I’ll give my life to get it done.”

“Oh?” The masked black-robed man seemed to smile slightly. “There are some things I want to know. So… I’d like to take a look at your memories.”

“Take a look at my memories?” Youngflame Lu Shao was startled, then said uneasily, “Senior…”

“I want to perform a soul-search on you. If you don’t resist, the damage probably won’t be too great. If you do resist, I’ll have to use force,” the masked black-robed man said. “Are you willing, or not?”

Youngflame Lu Shao’s expression was bitter, but he had no choice. After only a moment of hesitation, he gritted his teeth and said, “I am willing.”

“Mm.”

The masked black-robed man immediately reached out and placed his hand on Youngflame Lu Shao’s head, then executed the Thousand Stars Soul-Search technique.

…

In midair.

Ji Ning stood on a cloud, nodding slightly. “A Primal Daoist is a relatively high-ranking position within the Youngflame clan. They know quite a bit. It seems that within Dongfu Commandery, the hierarchy is strict and there are many formations. Even this Primal Daoist, Youngflame Lu Shao, can only go to certain areas. He only knows how to enter and exit some of the formations.”

This soul-searching had only revealed some of the grand formations in a few areas.

“Looks like I’ll need to find a few more Primal Daoists to get a better picture.”

Whoosh.

Ji Ning immediately phased through space, disappearing.

…

Ji Ning began to target other Primal Daoists of the Youngflame clan within Dongfu Commandery. The status of Primal Daoists varied, and so did their knowledge of the formations and prohibitions protecting the clan’s ancestral lair. Ji Ning gradually developed a rough understanding of the formations and prohibitions within the Chenyu Mountains of Dongfu Commandery. He passed all this information to Uncle White.

Uncle White was a formation grandmaster, capable of devising a better method of attack.

“Hahaha… so you want to soul-search me?” A green-robed man let out a wild laugh. “If I’m not mistaken, you must be that Ji Ning the Ancestors were talking about!”

“Not good.”

The masked black-robed figure, Ji Ning’s Primaltwin, immediately sensed something was wrong. He sent a thought.

Shing!

A wisp of sword-light appeared out of thin air, directly piercing through the green-robed man’s body, cutting him in half. The man’s Tortoise-Serpent Primal immediately flew out, but the sword-light enveloped it, shattering it directly. The human-shaped soul within began to prepare to enter the cycle of reincarnation.

“You think a self-detonation can keep me from soul-searching you?” Ji Ning was holding a black pearl that was exerting a powerful attractive force, pulling the human-shaped soul toward it.

When killing a Primal Daoist, one usually destroyed the Primal along with it, which would also wipe out the soul in the process.

But Ji Ning’s strength far exceeded the opponent’s. He had destroyed the Primal while preserving the soul, intending to collect it and then perform another soul-search.

“Soul-search? Hahaha…” The man’s human-shaped soul—the green-robed man—was roaring with mad fury. Tiny cracks began to appear on his soul, and then it shattered and dissipated.

“What?” Ji Ning sighed inwardly.

The technique of splitting one’s soul could be used by those with a sufficiently powerful soul, just as Ji Ning had once split his soul to create a Primaltwin. But for the enemy to split his soul into several cracks at once like this… it was complete soul annihilation.

“He actually destroyed his own soul.” Ji Ning sighed. “It seems the Youngflame clan does have some utterly loyal members after all.”

“And he guessed I was Ji Ning? He was quite clever.”

Ji Ning wasn’t surprised. He had already soul-searched several Primal Daoists, and had learned that the Youngflame clan’s Celestial Immortal Ancestors had long ago issued orders commanding the entire clan to be extremely careful, to prevent Ji Ning from infiltrating the clan’s sect.

“Those four Celestial Immortals ambushed me before. Even though they failed, they must have guessed that I cultivate the Eight-Nine Arcane Art,” Ji Ning mused to himself. “The Eight-Nine Arcane Art’s practitioners are best at infiltration and transformation. The Youngflame clan would have to be stupid not to prepare for it.”

“But even if they are prepared, so what? In all the Three Realms… even the heavily fortified Heavenly Court is a place that cultivators of the Eight-Nine Arcane Art can enter and leave at will.”

This was the true way!

Even though the enemy knew Ji Ning had the Eight-Nine Arcane Art, they were utterly unable to stop him from entering the Chenyu Mountains.

But at the same time…

With the enemy on guard, achieving his goals would be more difficult.

“This Primal Daoist just died. The Youngflame clan has probably already found out. Still, just one death shouldn’t be a big deal.” Ji Ning thought to himself. With the Youngflame clan’s vast size and power, in these turbulent times, one Primal Daoist dying wasn’t a major incident. But if two died in a row, it would definitely attract attention.

“That’s enough for now.”

“Uncle White.” The black-robed Ji Ning arrived in a hall within the mobile Immortal estate. Uncle White, Mu Northson, and Xiaoqing were all there.

“How did it go?” Whitewater Hound looked over.

“I checked the intelligence from Heavenly Treasures Mountain carefully on every single target, but I still ran into one who wasn’t afraid to die,” the black-robed Ji Ning shook his head. “That Youngflame Xun just killed himself. I didn’t even have time to force a soul-search.”

“Any large tribe will always have members willing to sacrifice for it,” Uncle White nodded.

“We soul-searched eight Primal Daoists in total, and collected quite a bit of information on the Youngflame clan’s Dongfu Commandery ancestral lair,” the black-robed Ji Ning said. “As for how to deal with those formations and prohibitions, that’s up to you, Uncle White.”

“Let me think it over.”

Uncle White nodded.

Ji Ning recorded the memories of the eight Primal Daoists concerning the formations and prohibitions of the clan’s ancestral lair onto a single Dharma-treasure bamboo slip, which he then handed to Uncle White.

From these scattered fragments, Uncle White could construct a rough understanding of the formations and prohibitions within the Chenyu Mountains.

Within the Chenyu Mountains of Dongfu Commandery. This mountain range stretched for nearly a million li, and was vast enough to contain plains, lakes, and even a great number of constructed cities. There were countless cities, some covering hundreds, even thousands, of li, housing vast populations of mortals. A single city could hold tens of millions of people.

Beneath the earth, beside lakes, on plains, and halfway up the mountains…

City after city, outpost after outpost.

The Chenyu Mountains were the absolute territory of the Youngflame clan!

“Ancestral Master, Ancestral Master!” A youth quickly made his way to a palace. The palace was made entirely of white jade, surrounded by a large number of beautiful maidservants. Each one was stunningly beautiful, some dressed so sheerly it was as if they were wearing nothing at all, their alluring bodies visible through the thin gauze. Others resembled elegant noblewomen, and still others were like vibrant young girls…

The youth swallowed hard.

All these maidservants were gathered from various places by his Ancestral Master, and were kept here to serve him alone.

This Ancestral Master was also the most uniquely positioned Loose Immortal in the entire Chenyu Mountains—a Loose Immortal who had lived for over a million years, the Fuhn Loose Immortal. Outsiders rarely called him ‘Immortal,’ preferring to call him ‘Old Fiend Fuhn.’ He was a true, great demonic fiend.

“What is it?” A black-haired, black-bearded old man was holding two beauties, looking completely at ease.

“Reporting to Ancestral Master, my Third Martial Uncle, he… he…” The youth knelt down immediately, sobbing, “My Third Martial Uncle is dead!”

“What?!”

Old Fiend Fuhn’s face changed drastically.

Among all the current Primal Daoists of the Youngflame clan’s Dongfu Commandery branch, the one he valued most was this martial nephew, ‘Youngflame Xun’. Although he wasn’t his disciple, he just liked the look of him. He even felt that Youngflame Xun was just like his younger self—a man who would commit any evil, yet was absolutely and fanatically loyal to the Youngflame clan.

And his talent was also high. That was why Old Fiend Fuhn had arranged for Youngflame Xun to work abroad. Only by experiencing real danger could he truly grow. But he never imagined that Youngflame Xun would actually die! As a core member being groomed within the clan, he naturally had protective treasures, and yet even so, he had died…

“Damn it! Damn it!” Old Fiend Fuhn was gnashing his teeth in rage.

“Investigate! Investigate!” Old Fiend Fuhn growled. “Find out exactly how Youngflame Xun died!”