After being jilted by the saintess at the beginning, why is she crying?

Honglian looked down at his bloodless face, then at the slight trembling of his fingertips due to the exhaustion of his spiritual energy.

A pang of pain shot through her heart, and she quickly reached out and hugged him tightly, pulling him into her warm embrace.

"Stop talking, calm your mind first."

Her voice was unusually gentle, as if it had concealed all her coldness and stubbornness.

She gently patted his back, slowly channeling a wisp of spiritual energy into his body to help stabilize his meridians.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the sect—

Xiao Xiyue was standing at the front of the crowd, looking at the slowly rotating Yin-Yang array above her head, both surprised and delighted.

She had just been setting up defenses with Liu Shiyin, preparing for a desperate battle, when suddenly everything changed.

"That's great! That's great!"

Liu Shiyin jumped up excitedly, her eyes slightly red: "We're saved! This formation looks amazing!"

"Hmm..." Xiao Xiyue nodded, but her gaze involuntarily drifted towards the back of the main peak.

Deep down, I had a feeling that this sudden turn of events was probably related to the person in my heart.

Even Chu Qingyi, who was originally prepared to suppress her old injuries and personally fight, had a strange light in her beautiful eyes at this moment.

She looked up at the slowly rotating Yin-Yang Five Elements Grand Array, feeling the vast and pure power of the array within, and was deeply shocked.

"It's actually a fourth-tier grand formation..."

She murmured to herself, a look of understanding mixed with a complex emotion flashing in her eyes.

"Could it be him...?"

She remembered that figure, that figure who always surprised everyone.

At this moment, outside the formation, on the two largest main ships, a man in black stood with his hands behind his back at the bow, his face gloomy.

He stared at the motionless light barrier, then at the rebounding attacks, his expression growing increasingly grim.

He snorted coldly, and with a flick of his wrist, a small banner the size of a palm appeared in his hand.

The small banner was entirely black. The moment it appeared, the surrounding temperature dropped sharply, and the pervasive demonic energy swirled around its surface as if it were a tangible substance.

Faintly, one could hear the mournful wails of ghosts emanating from within.

It is the Heavenly Demon Sect's most prized treasure—the Myriad Demon Banner.

He gripped the banner handle, raised his hand and waved it. Instantly, countless dark ghostly figures surged out of the banner, transforming into a sinister ghost tide that bared its fangs and claws as it pounced on the great formation!

The wailing of ghosts shook the heavens and the earth, as if thousands of fierce ghosts were howling in unison!

However, as soon as those ghostly figures approached the light curtain that flowed with the spiritual light of the five elements, they were repelled by the mutual generation and restraint of the five elements!

Some ghostly figures were burned into blue smoke by the crimson flames, some were cut in two by the golden light, and some were submerged by the water waves and entangled by the wood energy... None of them could break through that seemingly thin light barrier.

The man in black's expression changed slightly.

"Hmm? It's actually a fourth-tier grand formation?"

He murmured, a hint of apprehension flashing in his eyes.

He pondered for a moment, then slowly put away the Ten Thousand Demon Banner, refraining from further attacks.

"The Hehuan Sect actually has such a scheme in mind..."

He could tell that although the great formation was somewhat damaged, its foundation was intact. Forcibly breaking it would not be a matter of a day or two, and would inevitably come at a considerable cost.

He has always been a master of calculation.

Although the Tianxing Alliance had promised many benefits, those benefits had not yet truly reached him, and he was unwilling to sacrifice his entire fortune for someone else's grand cause.

Thinking of this, he raised his hand and waved it, causing a beam of light from a sound amplification spell to explode in the void, and a loud voice resounded throughout the entire battlefield:

"Listen up, people of the Hehuan Sect! Stop resisting! The Tianxing Alliance's reinforcements will be here soon! Hand over Lin Fengmian now and surrender to the Tianxing Alliance, or you may live! Otherwise—"

He paused, his gaze turning as cold as a snake, and his voice suddenly became sharp:

"When reinforcements arrive and the formation is broken, the entire Hehuan Sect will be utterly annihilated!"

On another flying boat, an old man dressed in the iconic white bone robe of the Yinshan Palace slowly stood up.

His face was gaunt, his eyes sunken, like a living corpse.

However, the aura emanating from him was unusually cold and solid.

He was clearly a powerful figure whose cultivation was no weaker than that of the man in black.

He stood with his hands behind his back at the bow of the boat, his gaze sweeping menacingly over the flowing Five Elements light barrier of the Hehuan Sect. He let out a cold laugh, his voice hoarse and grating, like sandpaper being rubbed together:

"Youngsters of the Hehuan Sect, I advise you to stop your wishful thinking. Among the major sects in Qingzhou, the Tianjian Sect and the Jingang Temple have already joined the Tianxing Alliance!"

Even the powerful Illusion Valley and Beast Taming Mountain in the Southern Region were barely holding on.

Why would a second-rate sect like yours try to stop a chariot by acting like a mantis trying to stop a chariot, risking the lives of thousands of people for a disciple who doesn't know his own limitations?

He paused, then his voice suddenly rose several decibels, carrying a decaying and sinister aura that pierced through the light barrier of the great formation:

"What exactly are you still insisting on? Do you really think that you can stop the overwhelming power of the Heavenly Star Alliance with this broken fourth-order formation?!"

Wake up! Surrender and you may live! Resist and you will die!

These words were like poisoned ice picks, piercing the hearts of many Hehuan Sect disciples.

Many disciples with low cultivation levels looked at each other, fear and doubt resurfacing in their eyes.

The Heavenly Sword Sect, a first-rate sect, has actually submitted to the Heavenly Star Alliance? The Vajra Temple, a sacred Buddhist site, has also defected?

Even those major sects have accepted their fate. Can a mere Hehuan Sect really withstand it?

Panic, like an invisible plague, quietly spread among the people inside the great formation.

However, on a mountain peak shrouded in clouds and mist on the side of the main peak of the Hehuan Sect, the atmosphere was completely different from the passionate atmosphere on the main peak.

This is the Xiao family's territory.

Whether elders or disciples, all were direct descendants of the Xiao family. At this moment, the atmosphere in the Xiao family's council hall was so oppressive it was almost palpable.

Xiao Qingtian, the patriarch of the Xiao family, stood with his hands behind his back in front of the hall, looking through the spirit window at the huge array diagram that covered the entire sect in the distance, his face dark and unreadable.

He originally came to the Hehuan Sect to test Chu Qingyi's strength and weakness. If he could gain some benefits or even replace her, that would be the best outcome.

But who would have thought that he would run into the Heavenly Demon Sect and Yinshan Palace joining forces to besiege the mountain? Now even he, the patriarch of the Xiao family, is trapped in this fourth-order formation.

"Ancestor, what should we do now?"

A middle-aged elder with a shrewd face paced back and forth anxiously, his voice low but filled with barely concealed restlessness:

"Those demonic cultivators outside have surrounded this place like an iron barrel. If our Xiao family continues to be tied to the Hehuan Sect, I'm afraid..."

He didn't finish his sentence, but his meaning was already quite clear.

The others also wore grim expressions, all looking at Xiao Qingtian. Someone whispered in agreement:

"Yes, Ancestor, the situation in Qingzhou has changed drastically. The Heavenly Star Alliance is too powerful to resist. Why should our Xiao family be buried with the Hehuan Sect, a ship that is about to sink?"