Starting as a stray dog, I embarked on a journey of cultivation.

Leaving the City of Ten Thousand Demons, we re-entered the Monster Mountain Range.

Gou An led Long Youzi as they slowly traversed the mountains and forests in their search.

Besides the three essential spiritual materials, any other usable spiritual materials encountered along the way will also be picked.

These three essential ingredients are not difficult to find; the difficulty lies in finding the year in which one can live in peace and security.

Unlike before, Gou An usually concealed his aura, but this time he released his demonic energy completely.

In this way, the high-level demonic beasts around will sense it and take the initiative to avoid it, which will reduce Gou An's troubles.

For Gou An now, even if he directly consumes an eighth or ninth-tier demon core, the increase in demon power wouldn't be much, so there's absolutely no need for him to go to the trouble of hunting these things.

They searched for three days in the Monster Mountain Range with Long Youzi, but they couldn't find a single spiritual material of sufficient age.

"Didn't you say you were good at finding these things?" Gou An couldn't help but tease Long Youzi.

Long Youzi scratched his head awkwardly: "Don't worry, Master, we'll definitely find it."

As he spoke, he looked around and finally pointed in one direction.

"Master, the spiritual energy is denser over there, let's go take a look!" Long Youzi went ahead first.

Gou An sighed and followed behind.

After traversing dense forests, Long Youzi led Gou An to a valley of chaotic rocks.

There is no dense vegetation here; it is mostly exposed rock.

"Could it be here?" Gou An frowned immediately.

"Master, this valley is located in a low-lying area, so the surrounding spiritual energy will naturally converge towards the center and settle in the valley," Long Youzi described to Gou An. "And the Soul-Binding Ancient Vine, a spiritual material, mostly grows in the crevices of cliffs. There must be many ancient vines in this place. If we are lucky, we will definitely be able to find one that is old enough."

"Alright!" Gou An nodded, "Then let's go in and take a look!"

Upon entering the valley, just as Long Youzi had described, ancient vines grew everywhere in the crevices of the cliffs on both sides, lying haphazardly and piled on top of each other.

Gou An and Long Youzi floated in mid-air, each searching for a cliff face and selecting the Soul-Binding Ancient Vine they needed from among the many vines.

However, although there are many ancient vines that attract souls, none of them are very old.

Furthermore, most of these vines are covered with traces of monsters gnawing on them, indicating that monsters frequently come here for a buffet.

Those that are older are unlikely to escape being devoured by monsters.

Just when Gou An and Long Youzi had been searching for more than an hour, turning the valley upside down, and thought their trip had been in vain...

Suddenly, Long Youzi shouted to Gou An, "Master, we've found it!"

Upon hearing the sound, Gou An immediately flew over.

At this moment, Long Youzi stood in front of a cliff face covered with old vines. After parting the thick old vines, he found a soul-binding ancient vine growing in the crevice between the rocks.

Unlike other ancient vines that are emerald green, this Soul-Binding Vine is dark in color, and it looks to be at least eight or nine hundred years old.

"There really is!" Gou An laughed heartily and quickly said to Long Youzi, "Hurry up and pick it off and put it away!"

"Alright, Master!" Long Youzi nodded immediately, flipped his hand and took out a shovel specially used for collecting herbs, and was about to dig down this Soul-Binding Ancient Vine.

Just then, a voice suddenly came from above the valley.

"Oh, so a person actually became a disciple of a demon?"

Upon hearing this, Gou An immediately looked up at the sky.

At some point, a man in white appeared at the top of the valley, looking down with a wicked grin.

A golden light flashed in Gou An's eyes, and he immediately judged the approximate cultivation level of this person, who had definitely entered the Golden Core stage.

Upon seeing the man's attire, Gou An immediately thought of the Tianxing Sect.

Looking back at the direction Long Youzi and I took in our search for spiritual materials, we realized we weren't heading towards the location of the Tianxing Sect. So how did we end up encountering them?

"Who I choose to take as my master is none of your business!"

The next second, after Long Youzi put the Soul-Binding Vine he had just picked into his storage bag, he immediately retorted to the white-robed cultivator above.

"Who you take as your master is none of my business!" The white-robed cultivator sneered again, then said, "But I'm currently refining a magic weapon, and I happen to be missing a demon core as an auxiliary ingredient."

As he spoke, he reached out and grabbed at the air, and a longsword of spiritual light appeared in his hand, clearly ready to make a move.

Gou An didn't say much, but simply reached out and clapped his hand in the air.

The next second, a large amount of foul-smelling black mist was released instantly, completely covering the entire valley.

"A mere trick!" The white-robed swordsman sneered and swung his sword towards the valley below.

The sword energy pierced through the black mist, only to find that the man and the demon in the valley had vanished without a trace.

He immediately stretched out two fingers and wiped them in front of his eyes. His eyes lit up instantly, and he locked onto the direction in a flash.

At this moment, Gou An and Long Youzi had already escaped through another exit of the valley and concealed their demonic aura.

"Master, why are we running?" Long Youzi followed behind Gou An, carrying a sword in his hand. "He's just one person. The two of us together might not be a match for him."

"You're a complete idiot!" Gou An couldn't help but curse, "He's wearing the robes of the Heavenly Star Sect!"

"The Celestial Star Sect?" Long Youzi suddenly realized, "One of the Twelve Dao Sects?"

"That's right!" Gou An nodded. "We're just out gathering herbs; there's no need for us to clash with them."

"But it seems he's catching up!" Long Youzi glanced behind him and could clearly feel a force getting closer and closer.

"Never mind, let's go faster!" Gou An unconsciously sped up.

"Master, I think we should fight him!" Long Youzi said with a look of dissatisfaction, "What I hate most are these disciples from major sects, they are all so arrogant."

"What's the point of competing?" Gou An rolled his eyes at Long Youzi. "You're only at the Void Core stage, while your opponent is at the Golden Core stage!"

"Isn't there still you, Master?" Long Youzi still wanted to fight: "Since Master is a transformed great demon, even if you haven't condensed your golden core, you're not that much worse."

"Do you know what the most terrifying thing about the disciples of the Grand Sect is?" Gou An suddenly asked.

"What?" Long Youzi asked, puzzled.

"That's because there are too many people!" Gou An said, "You may not understand this much since you were born into a small sect, but disciples of large sects kill one of the smaller ones, then another one comes along, kill one of the larger ones, and then another old one comes along."

"At this moment, it seems like there's only one enemy in front of us, but there might be many more nearby."

After all, whenever Gou An saw Tianxing Sect disciples in the Monster Beast Mountain Range, they were never alone; they were always in groups.

Gou An didn't want to be surrounded by this group of people.

Having heard what Gou An said, Long Youzi had no choice but to temporarily abandon his plans to fight.

Just then, the white-robed swordsman who had been chasing them suddenly appeared out of thin air and blocked Gou An and Long Youzi's path as they flew forward.

A talisman was still held between his fingers, and it was dissipating on its own.

"It's a teleportation talisman!" Long Youzi recognized it at a glance and quickly stopped the vehicle in mid-air.

Gou An also stopped, and with a flick of his right hand, he took out the Divine Iron Hammer.

"Fellow Daoist, is it really necessary to take action?" Gou An questioned the white-robed swordsman.

The white-robed swordsman held his head slightly higher, his face cold: "What right does a mere demon have to call me a fellow Daoist?"

"What are you so arrogant about?" Long Youzi stood side by side with Gou An, sword in hand. "Don't think we're afraid of you."

The white-robed swordsman rolled his eyes at Long Youzi and sneered, "I feel disgusted just talking to a human scum who hangs out with demons."

"Damn it!" Long Youzi was furious at those words, his hand gripping the sword hilt trembling slightly. "Master, I can't hold back anymore!"

"Since we can't avoid it, let's finish this quickly!" Although Gou An didn't want to fight, it seemed that he couldn't get through this situation without taking action.

"Alright!" Long Youzi suddenly flipped his hand, took out a pill, swallowed it, and his aura surged dramatically. "I'll go up and meet him first!"

Before Gou An could stop him, Long Youzi had already transformed into a streak of light and shot up, sweeping his sword across the white-robed swordsman.

This move, which seemed to be incredibly powerful, was easily blocked by the white-robed swordsman with a single sword strike.

"What a piece of trash!"

The white-robed swordsman cursed, flicked his wrist, and unleashed a sword strike that sent Long Youzi flying backward.

Gou An reacted quickly and caught Long Youzi from behind.

"Don't rush in blindly!" Gou An said to Long Youzi, "I'll fight him head-on, you just look for an opportunity to ambush him from the side!"

After saying this, Gou An tossed Long Youzi aside and stood in front of the white-robed swordsman.

Upon seeing this, Long Youzi immediately distanced himself and hid in the distance, ready to strike.

The white-robed swordsman glanced at Gou An and immediately saw through his plan, sneering, "Don't bother with all that, why don't you all come at me together!"

Gou An merely sneered without answering, then raised his left hand, the black snake bracelet on his wrist glowing faintly.

The next second, a black whirlwind roared out from his wrist, carrying with it a large number of barely perceptible black spikes.

As the black wind approached, the white-robed swordsman simply held his longsword horizontally, instantly condensing a spiritual energy shield.

Rumble!

The black wind crashed into the shield and was firmly blocked.

"You're a piece of trash too!" The white-robed swordsman sneered, and suddenly swept his longsword, a sword light instantly breaking through the black wind and heading straight for Gou An's position.

Gou An dared not be careless. While charging up the Divine Iron Hammer with his right hand, he used the Sky-Stepping Cloud-Soaring Technique to create distance in the air and dodge the sword energy.

But the next second, the white-robed swordsman swept two more sword energies at Gou An, who could only dodge them again with great difficulty.

"Your reaction was quite quick!" The white-robed swordsman's lips curled slightly, and he suddenly swung his sword more than a dozen times in the air, instantly sending a large amount of sword energy flying towards Gou An.

They were densely packed, like a net of swords.

Faced with this move, Gou An knew he couldn't dodge it, but he didn't want to waste a layer of his protective magic treasure.

He immediately used the Demonic Essence Dharma Form. As his muscles swelled, a red demonic form instantly covered his entire body, as if he were wearing a suit of armor.

Gou An controlled the demonic form and blocked it with both hands.

Bang bang bang!

The next second, a continuous stream of sword energy slashed down, but was ultimately blocked by the demonic cloak.

"Oh!" the white-robed swordsman couldn't help but exclaim upon seeing this, "You can even condense a Dharma form! Your demon core looks to be of quite high quality!"