Starting My Cultivation With Time Management-Chapter 974 - 114: I Want to Reverse Thinking

After directly killing Mo Gu, Ling Yunpo disappeared once more in front of everyone.

The elders of the Nether Ghost Path instantly descended into chaos, none of them having anticipated that the Tai Yin Sword Master would brazenly infiltrate their ranks and take out Mo Gu so decisively.

Moments later, about ten breaths of time passed, and the elders received a transmission from the secret realm, revealing that the Tai Yin Sword Master was now situated several kilometers north of their position—clearly in the midst of a rapid retreat.

At this point, the lack of unified command became glaringly obvious.

Some elders of the Nether Ghost Path immediately chose to pursue the Sword Master in the given direction.

Others, however, suspected that the reported location was bait, likely rigged with traps waiting for them to step into, and thus refrained from chasing.

Some remained in their current location, dealing with the loose cultivators who were still arriving with intelligence reports; others quietly withdrew from the scene to seek out Elder Lianshan elsewhere.

Using Ah Jing’s teleportation, Ling Yunpo had left the immediate area but deliberately stayed within their detection range to allow the secret realm to continue broadcasting his position.

Afterward, he quickly departed by sword control, leaving the Kunlun Mirror nearby to scout how many Nether Ghost Path elders were following him.

It wasn’t long before the Kunlun Mirror returned with its report.

"Just as expected." Ling Yunpo burst into laughter upon hearing the Kunlun Mirror’s words. "As soon as Mo Gu is dead, the people of the Nether Ghost Path instantly lose their backbone."

"Exactly," the Kunlun Mirror said with a touch of emotion. "They still assume your Achilles’ heel lies in your True Yuan’s stamina, yet their flaws are far more obvious than yours."

"Once the commanding Mo Gu is removed from the stage, the remaining elders naturally fall into disagreement, each acting on their own."

"That’s precisely it," Ling Yunpo said smugly. "Because the competition within the Demon Cult is even more brutal than in the Orthodox Sect, most of these elders are extraordinarily opinionated individuals. Organizing them to act as one is far harder than it ever would be in the Orthodox Sect."

"Mo Gu’s ability to lead them wasn’t due to his cultivation level or reputation but because he’s the son of Sect Leader Fu Xie, wielding the authority and resources of the Sect Leader’s faction."

"Apart from Mo Gu, who else could rally these elders together? Absolutely no one."

"Aren’t you forgetting someone?" the Kunlun Mirror interjected. "What about Wen Yang?"

"Wen Yang…" Ling Yunpo pondered for a moment before continuing, "If these elders were inclined to follow Wen Yang’s command, they wouldn’t have aligned themselves with Mo Gu in the first place."

"Now that Mo Gu has been eliminated, some of the opportunists may turn to Wen Yang for support. However, the majority will still act independently. It’s not that they don’t care about the sect’s mission, but they’re more focused on demonstrating their own stance to Sect Leader Fu Xie."

"The complexities of human nature are truly remarkable," sighed the Kunlun Mirror. "So, what’s your next move?"

"Once I deal with these Nether Ghost Path pursuers, the only remaining threats to me will be the loose cultivators, right? Hmm, given the quality and organization of those loose cultivators, I doubt they pose any real danger to me at all."

"Pretty much," Ling Yunpo replied nonchalantly. "Ah Jing, help me identify which loose cultivators are nearby."

"Loose cultivators?" the Kunlun Mirror asked in surprise. "What are you planning…?"

"If they’re allowed to hunt me, why can’t I turn the tables and hunt them instead?" Ling Yunpo retorted self-righteously. "See, even those fools from the Nether Ghost Path know that my biggest weakness is my lack of stamina."

"If I were to keep running while they pursue me, I would eventually run my reserves dry. So why not eliminate as many cultivators as possible in the meantime, forcing this trial to conclude faster?"

Would you even experience True Yuan depletion? The Kunlun Mirror silently grumbled. A guy so lazy he couldn’t even be bothered to use sword control himself, relying on me for teleportation—what right does he have to talk about a ’stamina issue’?

"You’re absolutely right," she said insincerely. "So, what kind of loose cultivators should I look for?"

"Just find ones traveling in small groups," Ling Yunpo said with a cold smile. "That old man mentioned this secret realm tests luck and fate, didn’t he?"

"In that case, even if they’re eliminated under my sword, they’ll have no one to blame but their own bad luck."

Again with the practiced excuse-making… The Kunlun Mirror sighed quietly but nodded in agreement.

Not long after, Ling Yunpo received some intel:

Northwest, twenty miles away, green Sword Light, appears to be a female cultivator.

With that, he merged with the Tai Yin Suming Sword in Man-Sword Unity, trailing a high-speed, bright Sword Light as he charged toward his target in the northwest.

——————

The loose cultivators who had been hired by the Nether Ghost Path to locate the Tai Yin Sword Master were baffled to discover that the Nether Ghost Path members suddenly vanished.

Could it be that some lucky person had already found the Tai Yin Sword Master and claimed the promised reward from the Nether Ghost Path?

Unable to discern the truth, they reluctantly scattered, resuming their scheming and plotting against one another.

In this apocalyptic, disaster-stricken world, the presence of other people was more terrifying than the calamity itself.

If one encountered an unfamiliar cultivator with a higher cultivation level (and the latter was confident in this disparity), there was an immediate risk of being hunted down.

As a result, some cultivators adopted an ostrich-like strategy, seeking hidden places to hunker down and simply survive until the secret realm trial ended.

However, with much of the land submerged under seawater and the ocean depths fraught with danger, most could only aimlessly wander in search of safe shelter.

Gradually, an odd rumor began to circulate among familiar groups of cultivators.

It was said that the Tai Yin Sword Master had not been captured by the Nether Ghost Path. Instead, someone had once again received an automated transmission from the secret realm.

Unfortunately, before they could hunt down the Tai Yin Sword Master, he had already appeared and attacked first. Out of four or five people, only one fastest escapee managed to survive.

Now that survivor was rallying other cultivators to join forces against the Tai Yin Sword Master in hopes of seizing the trial’s final prize for themselves.

As such, many cultivators stopped competing against each other and headed toward the survivor’s reported location.

Soon, before they could reach the meeting point, another piece of news spread:

The survivor had gathered a group of three to forty cultivators, only for the Tai Yin Sword Master to infiltrate their ranks and, with a few strikes, mow them all down.

Clearly, the claim of a few sword swings taking out dozens of people was an exaggeration—he likely used some kind of Sword Dao Techniques to eliminate most of them.

Nonetheless, this alerted everyone to the fact that their target was arrogant and unrelenting… Not only was he refusing to flee, but he was planning to counterattack his pursuers!

Little did they know what awaited them as they hastily formed alliances and prepared to hunt this audacious Tai Yin Sword Master!