Chapter 1397: Chapter 12: Encountering a Ghost

"Bang!"

After rushing forward dozens of miles.

Ao Ying was thrown out of the void, landing rather awkwardly on the snow.

At this moment, her face was even paler than the snow.

"Did I shake them off?"

Ao Ying, who had always been irreverent towards ghosts and gods, couldn’t help but feel a trace of panic rising uncontrollably in her Heart Lake. She couldn’t help but look back, staring intently at the rift where the void had shattered, while once again forming a seal, carefully controlling the opening and closing of her [Feng Mou].

Ao Ying was ready.

If those "dirty things" rushed out from the torrent of the void.

She would immediately unleash all means, with the Dragon Descendant’s Blazing Flame, to annihilate them completely.

This was no longer the [Ruins].

The Demon Country’s soil was barren, the primordial energy thin, but there was still a trace of primordial energy here.

Recklessly using divine skills would attract the attention of Chiling City.

But compared to being hunted by Chiling City, Ao Ying was even more afraid of being entangled by these dirty things.

She waited for a long time.

Until the rift in the void completely closed.

Only then did Ao Ying breathe a sigh of relief; evidently, those dirty things had failed to traverse the void and should have been shaken off by her.

She instinctively leaned back.

The place chosen by her [Feng Mou] for escape was a small snow mountain, with a large rock behind her at this moment.

"Shaking off those dirty things isn’t that easy..."

At this moment.

A lazy voice sounded from above her head.

Ao Ying was taken aback.

Only then did she realize that the unease in her Heart Lake had not disappeared with the successful traverse of [Feng Mou].

From the moment she ended her seclusion.

The unease in her heart built up like a flood.

At this moment...

Ao Ying completely understood the reason.

She slowly raised her head, looking cautiously behind her.

On top of the large rock, at some unknown time, there crouched a young, lean figure in black.

There was no doubt, this guy was even more terrifying than the previous "dirty things." Ao Ying, who had been in a highly stressed state, hadn’t noticed the divine soul aura of such a figure at all. It could be foreseen... if this person hadn’t spoken, she wouldn’t have noticed a thing.

"These things, almost undying and undefeated."

"Even if shredded by the torrent of the void, they won’t truly vanish. They’ll piece together in another life form, resurrecting..."

"Though it’s unclear how they got onto you, if I’m not mistaken, they’re still ’advancing’ at this moment. Based on this speed, it won’t be long before ’they’ appear before you again."

The young figure crouched on the rock, resting a cheek in his hand, gazing into the distance toward the [Ruins].

The gaze was deep.

As if penetrating the void, truly seeing something.

"You..."

Ao Ying’s voice trembled: "Who are you?"

She stared at the young figure as if facing a formidable enemy, her hair standing on end.

Her intuition told her.

This was an existence a thousand times more fearsome than those dirty things.

What was more terrifying was...

Another intuition told her.

She should have met this person before.

"Forgot me so quickly?"

Xie Xuanyi slowly shifted his gaze downward, smiling as he looked at the woman in red before him: "Do you not remember, our first meeting was in a similar setting..."

With a "swish".

Ao Ying’s face turned deathly pale.

In fact, from the moment they met, she had a vague guess in her heart.

Young, dressed in black, a Human Race Sword Cultivator, with a cultivation realm far superior to hers, unfathomable... meeting all these conditions.

In this world, it seemed there was only one such person.

Coincidentally, the first time Ao Ying and Xie Xuanyi met, indeed it was such a scenario.

In the southern part of the Demon Country, at Resentful Ghost Ridge, a forbidden zone of an ancient battlefield ravaged by a Great Tribulation, a place nearly untrodden by anyone.

Ao Ying disguised as a resentful female spirit, pleaded with Xie Xuanyi to stay his steps, to help avert an urgent crisis, intending to use this to kill with a borrowed knife.

Three years later, when the two met again.

Fate indeed loves to play tricks on people...

The identical scenario, the identical encounter.

"Benevolent one, such a coincidence?"

Ao Ying forced a difficult smile: "Never thought I’d run into you here..."

"Yes... what a coincidence indeed..."

Xie Xuanyi sighed with emotion, suddenly asking: "Did you know I’ve been looking for you for a long time?"

As the saying goes, you search high and low, only to find it when you least expect.

That’s exactly it.

He asked Cui Zhen for help, exerting great effort to inquire throughout the Four Realms of the Demon Country, but Ao Ying seemed to have vanished into thin air, disappearing without a trace.

Trying to find Ao Ying.

Was akin to fish searching in the ocean.

The probability was extremely low, but coincidentally, not zero.

Right on this day.

Right at this moment.

"..."

Ao Ying’s expression was exceedingly complex; she never imagined that the true reason for the unease in her Heart Lake was meeting Xie Xuanyi in such a ghastly place.

Of course, she knew that Xie Xuanyi had been looking for her all along.

The Lotus Token hadn’t rung just once these past three years.

Ao Ying was a fugitive, a gambler; she was prepared to lose everything the moment she stole the [Feng Mou] from Chiling City.

She certainly wasn’t going to respond to Xie Xuanyi.

With the Red Dragon Fortune, plus the Feng Mou, it was her fundamental basis for proving the Dao Yang God, achieving the Great Venerable!

After Ao Ying’s return to the Demon Country, it didn’t take her long to infer that the so-called "Sword Gu" of Xie Xuanyi was likely a ruse.

After all, there’s no such thing as a Gu Poison that never acts up.

Xie Xuanyi was no saint.

Of course... the soul vow made back then was not within Ao Ying’s consideration.

From the start, she saw the situation clearly; if she truly faced death one day, Xie Xuanyi wouldn’t come across the Northern Territory to save her with the little favor from the Northern Hunt of the Great Yue Kingdom. Finding a remote, quiet place to hide, wasn’t considered to break the soul vow, it was her optimal solution to survive.

"I..."

Just as Ao Ying was about to speak.

An alarming thought suddenly arose in her Heart Lake.

Rumble!

The void behind her that had previously closed tightly suddenly burst open with a huge gap!

Ao Ying’s divine thought sensed danger, precisely as Xie Xuanyi had predicted, those dirty things weren’t killed by the torrent of the void but instead were pieced together, forming an ugly monster beyond Ao Ying’s comprehension, roaring and lunging with its bloodied mouth wide open.

"Don’t look back."

Xie Xuanyi spoke expressionlessly, uttering three words that seemed like a Divine Decree.

Ao Ying had never imagined that in such a life-and-death situation, her body would freeze against her will.

Then.

The young Sword Cultivator crouched on the rock reached out with two fingers, casually brushing through the air.

With a "swish".

A stream of sword qi swept across, and the roaring abruptly ceased!

The split void was "stitched" up as if mended with thread, tightly closing.

As for the menacing "monster", it was instantly sliced in half.

Sizzles and crackles.

Corpse fragments rained down like droplets, striking the ground, quickly igniting; under the annihilation of the purest "Path of Destruction", the dirty things capable of resisting even the torrent of the void were reduced to ashes within moments.