Cultivation begins in Qingfeng Market.

This is the outskirts of the dynasty. Although it is difficult, as long as we can get out, with the help of many cultivators, there will be no danger to our lives.

The fleet took off again and flew deeper into the air.

The territory of the Heavenly Fire Dynasty stretched out beneath my feet like a charred cloth; what was once farmland was now nothing but scorched black.

The place, which used to be a village, is not even a ruin; only a few charred wooden stakes are stuck crookedly in the ground.

In the distance, a volcano was still erupting, continuously emitting smoke, like a wounded beast panting.

The ground around the crater cracked open in countless places, and magma seeped out from the fissures, turning the entire land a dark red.

The spiritual energy here was extremely violent.

"Be careful, maintain altitude, and don't let the airships land unnecessarily," Lin Zhao ordered the fleet. "If you see anyone, use your flying artifacts to go and pick them up."

The airship flew slowly at low altitude, like a flock of birds circling above a sea of ​​fire.

The first place to be discovered was a village.

To be precise, it was the ruins of a village. Almost all the houses had collapsed, leaving only a few broken walls. The old locust tree at the entrance of the village had been uprooted and lay across the middle of the road, its trunk still smoking. People were moving around in the ruins.

Lin Zhao ordered two flying boats to land, and several Qi Refining cultivators flew down to search through the ruins.

Five or six people were pulled out of the collapsed house. The leader was a middle-aged man whose leg was broken and whose face was as pale as paper. Then a group of children were pulled out of the cellar next to the house. They were trembling and too scared to speak.

The flying boat carried them back. As the middle-aged man was brought aboard, he suddenly grabbed the sleeve of the cultivator beside him, his lips trembling, his voice so hoarse it was almost inaudible: "There are...there are still people inside...at the east end of the village, the Li family's..."

The monk nodded: "We'll go find it. You go up first."

The man was carried into the cabin, still looking back in the direction of the village.

Lin Zhao stood at the bow of the ship, looking down at the ruins below.

One spirit ship after another flew overhead, heading deeper into the distance. In the distance, the spirit ships of the Zixuan Dynasty also arrived, their flags fluttering in the wind. Further away, even more points of light moved about, like fireflies, twinkling in the red sky.

He took a deep breath.

The air was hot and smelled of sulfur.

"Keep going," he said.

The fleet took off again and flew deeper into the air.

Behind them, the first batch of rescued mortals had already been sent back to the border camp ahead of schedule.

Elder He's purification array should be set up by now, and those who were burned by spiritual energy should be fine.

There are many more people waiting ahead of them.

The further in you fly, the more horrific the scene becomes.

Lin Zhao stood at the bow of the Qinglin ship, the Heavenly Spirit Mirror in his hand gleaming with a faint blue light. This palm-sized bronze mirror was now the eyes of his team.

The mirror surface is covered with countless points of light, like stars in the night sky—each point of light is a living person.

Some were moving, some were still, and some were so faint they were almost invisible, like candle flames that could go out at any moment.

"Thirteen miles to the northwest, there are seventeen people," he reported a location.

The two Tier 1 flying boats immediately changed direction and flew close to the ground. Several Qi Refining cultivators jumped off the boats and searched through the ruins. Before long, more than a dozen people were pulled out.

Four second-tier spirit boats were on guard around the perimeter.

Dozens of Foundation Establishment cultivators were scattered throughout the thirty-mile search and rescue network, relying on their powerful strength to take charge of the most important rescue work—forcibly lifting the collapsed roof beams, moving the large stones blocking the cave entrances, and using their spiritual power to protect the mortals whose bodies had been invaded by the fire poison.

The Qi Refining cultivators followed behind, using various flying artifacts to transport those who had just been pulled from the ruins onto the first-tier flying boats.

He originally bought the Heavenly Spirit Mirror to use in conjunction with the Golden Phoenix Bow to snipe opponents from a distance, but now he's using it to save people.

Although Lin Zhao found it somewhat absurd, he also felt it was nothing special. He could only say that things are unpredictable, and magical artifacts are neither good nor bad; it all depends on the person using them.

More than a thousand Qi Refining cultivators moved about in the vicinity, piloting more than a hundred first-tier flying boats.

The airships were packed with people, with dozens or even hundreds of people crammed into each one. Some children were too small to walk, so they were carried on someone's back. Some elderly people were too weak to walk, so they were carried onto the airships.

The flying boat's spiritual energy shield was activated to its maximum extent, isolating it from the rampant fire-attribute spiritual energy outside.

In half a day, they searched over a hundred miles and rescued tens of thousands of people.

All the airships were full.

The first deck was packed like sardines, and the second deck wasn't much better; the deck was crammed with people, and the cabins were also packed to the brim.

Lin Zhao ordered a retreat, and on the way back, they passed a volcano that was still smoking.

With a loud boom, a plume of thick smoke erupted from the crater, and dozens of boulders were thrown into the air, scattering like cannonballs. The largest one, as big as a house, was covered in lava and trailed a long plume of black smoke as it hurtled toward the airship.

Yan Chiheng reacted the fastest. He stood at the bow of his spirit boat, clasped his hands together, and a bolt of lightning shot out from his palms, striking the boulder directly.

Boom! The boulder exploded into fragments, scattering pieces everywhere. But those fragments were all imbued with spiritual energy, flying in all directions. Most of them were blocked by Yan Chiheng's lightning net and exploded into powder in mid-air.

However, some still slipped through and crashed next to several first-tier airships.

The fragments didn't hit anyone, but the fire elemental energy attached to them traveled up the airship along with the shockwave.

This was nothing to the cultivators, but it was now extremely deadly to the mortals on the flying boat, and countless mortals began to cough.

Lin Zhao immediately unleashed his Dharma Domain.

Five illusory mountain shadows appeared near the flying boat, their five-colored light flowing like a giant palm, stabilizing the spiritual energy within a ten-mile radius.

The restless fire elemental energy was forcibly suppressed. Like a wild beast with its throat being choked, it struggled a few times and then stopped moving. The mortals on the flying boat also stopped coughing.

"Let's go," Lin Zhao said.

The fleet accelerated, passing through the still-smoking volcano, and flew towards the border.

The border camp has been set up.

Old He chose a good location—a plain at the foot of a small hill, with an open terrain and a stream.

The camp stretched for over twenty miles, with a cleansing array used to create a safe zone. The tents were arranged in rows, simple but sturdy.

The camp, which could accommodate over a million people, could not be supported by Cangyun Mountain alone in a short time. Fortunately, more and more independent cultivators and small forces from the surrounding areas gathered, and together they managed to set up a semblance of a camp.

The camp of the Zixuan Dynasty was just a few dozen miles away, much larger than this place, covering an area of ​​thirty miles. The first batch of rescue cultivators numbered over ten thousand, and they clearly made a significant contribution.

Along the nearly thousand-mile border from Dingfeng Plain to the border of the Tianhuo Dynasty, there are more than a dozen such camps, all of which are being urgently set up.

Those who remained at the camp were mostly people with low cultivation levels, or those in charge of logistics like Elder He. The truly powerful Foundation Establishment cultivators were all leading their teams to rescue people inside.

The Southern Dynasty's camp was located in the far north. As the strongest force in the vicinity, their performance was only so-so—the camp was arranged in a regular manner, and they had a decent number of people, but it always gave people a feeling of being completely businesslike.

Adding to what Su Qianxue had said before, Lin Zhao's suspicions about Xuan Chen Valley grew stronger.

However, lacking evidence and given the formidable strength of Xuan Chen Valley, he couldn't say much.