The Xu family follows Taoism and seeks longevity

After coming out of the underground cave, Xu Zhiyu searched for the passage for more than a month according to the map markings, but since there were no clues, he did not gain anything.

On this day, his figure suddenly appeared at a location marked on the map. Looking from a distance, he saw that the place was covered with quicksand and lifeless.

"That's right. This should be the 'quicksand land' recorded on the map. As long as we pass through this quicksand and then pass the lake ahead, we will reach the miasma swamp."

Looking at the endless desert ahead, Xu Zhiyu's eyes were filled with solemnity.

It's not easy to pass here because it is painted red on the map.

In order to allow monks to distinguish the degree of danger of areas in the secret realm, map makers deliberately marked them with different colors.

Green means no danger, orange means slight danger and you need to be cautious, yellow means very dangerous and it is not recommended to approach, and red means extremely dangerous and you must avoid it if you encounter it.

According to the records on the map and the densely packed notes, you can learn in detail the reasons why this quicksand is dangerous.

Although this place is only ten thousand miles in size and does not cover a large area, there is only one way to get through it, and that is to walk. Yes, you can only walk.

But if that were all, it wouldn't be that scary, because those who can enter the secret realm are all Jindan cultivators, and walking is no problem for them.

But what makes people most reluctant to set foot here is the endless variety of monsters and beasts that appear here. It is said that there are as many as fifty or sixty kinds of monsters living here, and they are the kind of social monsters with extremely strong defense.

There are a lot of creatures like 'Soul-Devouring Ants' and 'Soul-Eating Earth Scorpions' here.

In the quicksand, if he were attacked by a swarm of hundreds of thousands of insects, even if he was a Jindan cultivator with great skills, it would be very likely that he would find it difficult to escape. The saying "a swarm of ants can kill an elephant" is no joke.

This made him wonder for a moment whether he should go through here or not, because if the airspace was not restricted, it would only take him half a day to pass through here, but if the airspace was restricted, it would take at least half a month, and he really didn't have so much time to waste.

It turned out that the opening time of the secret realm had not been extended this time and was still one year. This was what the Lord of Xuanyang City had personally instructed them before they entered the secret realm.

However, bypassing here and going somewhere else is not a good option, because the area of ​​this quicksand basically accounts for about one-tenth of the entire Xuanyang Secret Realm. If he does not go in, what if the passage to the spiritual world is inside?
After standing here and thinking for a while, Xu Zhiyu finally decided to go and take a look, because he had to go sooner or later.

"I hope I won't be too unlucky and encounter a group of 'Soul Devouring Ants' or something like that, otherwise..."

With a sigh, he landed at the edge of the quicksand and walked in on foot.

The first feeling when stepping on the quicksand was heat. He could guarantee that the temperature was definitely around several hundred degrees, dozens of times higher than the outside world. However, this temperature was nothing to him, as cultivators were immune to cold and heat.

After entering the quicksand, he did not just keep moving forward. He would occasionally change direction, walking one or two hundred miles to the left and right of the direction he was moving in, then use his spiritual sense to scan the surroundings, hoping to find the passage.

"It's really fucking troublesome. If I were a Nascent Soul cultivator, my spiritual sense would cover thousands of miles. I would just need to walk straight ahead and emit spiritual sense to cover this area of ​​quicksand. No hidden details would be able to escape."

After walking for five or six days without any results, Xu Zhiyu became impatient and said that after calculating the distance, he had basically reached the center of the quicksand.

The temperature here is higher than where he just came in, comparable to the surface of volcanic magma. Even though Xu Zhiyu has a strong body, he still feels a hint of heat.

What he didn't know was that right after he stepped into the quicksand, another person also appeared here, but she didn't step in immediately.

Needless to say, this person was still Fan Yunbai. After entering the secret realm, she just released her spiritual sense slightly, locked onto Xu Zhiyu's position, and then immediately rushed to his side.

To be honest, until she entered this secret place, she still didn't understand what he was doing here.

Although she didn't dare to release her suppressed cultivation for the sake of the stability of the secret realm, her spiritual sense could. With just a quick glance, all the situations in the secret realm appeared in her mind.

In her eyes, such a secret realm was really not worthy of being mentioned in public, because they had seven or eight Xuantian Ice Palaces, and four or five of higher grade than this one, not to mention that they also occupied a blessed land.

She glanced at the spiritual objects produced here one by one. Except for a Ningying fruit tree that was slightly pleasing to her eye, the others were not worth her attention at all.

However, it was not until she followed Xu Zhiyu to this quicksand and released her spiritual sense again that she realized that she seemed to have overlooked something. There really was something hidden underneath that even she could not tell the depth of. It was buried deep in the earth's core about 20 miles away from the quicksand.

"Could it be that he entered the secret realm just to find this place? Fortunately, I followed him, otherwise his efforts would have been in vain."

Fan Yunbai stared deep into the ground, his gaze seemed to penetrate the thick layer of quicksand and reach the ground directly, while he muttered to himself.

As for why she concluded that Xu Zhiyu's efforts would be in vain without her help, she had sufficient basis for it.

Because the coverage of a cultivator's spiritual awareness is strictly affected by the medium.

Take Xu Zhiyu at this time for example. Because he has practiced the secret method of spiritual consciousness, although his current cultivation level is only the third level of Golden Core, the strength of his spiritual consciousness is comparable to that of a cultivator at the eighth level of Golden Core.

With the strength of his spiritual sense, if there are no obstacles blocking his surroundings and the area around him is empty, then the coverage area of ​​his spiritual sense is about eight hundred miles.

But if he entered the sea and drilled into the sea, this range would immediately begin to shrink and would only cover an area of ​​a hundred miles around him.

And if he wanted to use his spiritual sense to scan below the ground, the range would be greatly reduced, to only a pitiful ten miles or so.

Although the quicksand here is not as solid as real land, its blocking effect on spiritual consciousness is almost the same. Therefore, even if he used his spiritual consciousness to fully exert itself and explored the underground, he still could not find anything.

Fan Yunbai flashed and appeared 20 miles underground. Coincidentally, the place where she stood at the moment was exactly where Xu Zhiyu was standing. She looked down and saw five huge pillars standing at her feet, divided according to the five elements, and there were countless complex and indistinguishable carvings on the top of the pillars.

Moreover, there seemed to be some kind of induction between the pillars. In the middle of the five pillars, there seemed to be a magical force that was waiting to be unleashed. It was a force that even a cultivator like her who had reached the great perfection of the Spiritual Transformation Realm could feel trembling.

"Who built these five pillars? Why can't I even tell what they are made of after sensing them for such a long time? However, one thing is certain, the material used to build these pillars is of very high quality, probably the material that has reached the sixth level.

What secrets were hidden here? And how did he know that such a place existed? It was becoming increasingly difficult to understand.

However, according to my observation, the mysterious patterns on the top of the five pillars seem to be somewhat like runes of talismans. However, I know very little about talismans and am not too sure.

By the way, isn't Xu a talisman maker? Although he is only at the fourth level, maybe he can see something. Maybe he is here for this?

Now we should think of a way to lure him here, but how should we proceed? This requires careful planning. "

After staring at the five giant pillars for a long time without any gain, Fan Yunbai whispered, then she raised her head and looked towards where Xu Zhiyu was. This look gave her a good idea.

At this moment, Xu Zhiyu was standing in the center of the quicksand and scanning the surrounding environment with his spiritual sense. Suddenly, he discovered that many tiny breaths of life appeared under the nearby quicksand.

After discovering this situation, he cursed inwardly and then complained:
"It's really unlucky. What I feared came true. I actually ran into a 'swarm of soul-devouring ants'. I have to get rid of them quickly, otherwise it will be troublesome if they entangle me."

Thinking of this, he immediately took out a stack of talisman papers and threw them out before the Soul-Devouring Ant came out of the ground.

These talismans were all drawn by him. They are ranked as the third-grade top grade and are called Flame Talismans. After being sacrificed, they can produce an ultra-high temperature sea of ​​fire with great lethality.

However, he seemed to have miscalculated and taken things for granted. Fire attack was indeed a good choice for dealing with small, gregarious monsters such as spiders, scorpions, centipedes and the like.

But he seemed to have forgotten that the place where these "Soul-Devouring Ants" lived was in the extremely hot quicksand, and the temperature of the sand here seemed to be no less than that of his third-grade top-grade Flame Talisman.

Therefore, the high-temperature flames produced by his talismans, which were highly anticipated, did not cause any harm to the group.

In just a short while, the situation changed drastically, and a terrifying scene appeared.

All around where Xu Zhiyu was standing, a red tide was surging rapidly on the ground, and countless demon ants gathered from all directions in an instant. Although each of these little guys did not look big, seeing so many of them gathered together was still very intimidating.

These purple-red demon ants have pincer-like claws and a pair of sharp and powerful teeth. Their crawling speed is comparable to that of Qi-cultivating monks flying with swords.

If a Qi-refining cultivator encounters only ten or eight of them, he can easily deal with them; if there are more than a few hundred of them, a Foundation-building cultivator can also kill them all. However, if there are tens of thousands of them, even if a Purple Mansion cultivator takes action, it will take some effort to get rid of them.

And now, there are about 100,000 soul-devouring ants surrounding Xu Zhiyu. Even if two late Jindan cultivators encounter such a group of "Soul-Devouring Ants", they will have to flee in panic.

Xu Zhiyu said that he also wanted to escape, but he couldn't because he couldn't fly here, and these guys were very fast. Many of them had already come to his side, waving their big claws and were about to attack him.

If it were just biting, he would not be afraid. What he feared most about these ants was that once they gnawed him closely, they would gnaw at the cultivator's soul power, that is, his spiritual consciousness, which was also the reason for their name.

Thinking of this, he first held up a thunder shield, then took out a fourth-level talisman and began to throw it at the ant colony that was getting closer and closer.

It turns out that it is necessary to carry more talismans with you when going out. As a large number of talismans are continuously sacrificed, the number of the "Soul-Devouring Ants" group decreases at a rapid rate.

The last low-grade fourth-order queen ant that crawled out of the ground became furious when she saw her offspring being slaughtered by Xu Zhiyu. She flapped her wings and rushed towards him.

"You're here just in time. I was just afraid you'd hide and not show up."

Looking at the 'Soul-Devouring Ant' queen ant that was getting closer and closer and was obviously many times larger than him, Xu Feng's eyes flashed with a cold light. He clasped his hands together and a ray of lightning came out of his body and struck the queen ant directly.

"squeak!"

A tooth-grinding scream came from the queen ant's mouth. The 'Soul-Devouring Ants' that were attacking Xu Zhiyu's magic shield stopped their attacks after hearing the queen ant's scream and quickly headed towards the queen ant's position.

Seeing this situation, he breathed a sigh of relief. The lightning attack just now should have seriously injured the queen ant. If the ant was smart, it would definitely run away when it was seriously injured and the tribe suffered heavy casualties.

However, he seemed to have overestimated the wisdom of these "Soul-Devouring Ants". The ants that gathered around the queen ant, as if they had received some order, actually came back and wanted to continue attacking him.

"Misfortunes sent by heaven can be forgiven, but misfortunes brought upon oneself cannot be forgiven. This is true no matter where you put it. Since you are seeking your own death, don't blame me for being cruel and ruthless."

Xu Zhiyu whispered, and dozens of third-level talismans formed a circle in front of him, and then shot out instantly, shooting towards the ant colony that was surrounding him from all directions.

At the same time, he once again made hand gestures and summoned a lightning bolt that was even brighter than before, striking the half-dead queen ant lying not far away.

This time, the lightning flashed into the body of the 'Soul-Devouring Ant' and seemed to have caused no harm to it. However, only three breaths later, the huge body of the queen ant exploded, and it died instantly.

At the same time, the dozens of attack talismans he cast out also encountered the besieging ants.

Suddenly, there was a continuous sound of "bang bang bang" explosions, as if someone was setting off firecrackers. It was not until half a quarter of an hour later that the sound completely disappeared.

Xu Zhiyu sniffed and smelled a strong burnt odor. He looked around and found the corpses of the Soul Devouring Ants all over the ground. (End of this chapter)