There was still a considerable gap in strength between the thin, tall, vicious hag's soul body and the Feng family's ancestor. It was just that the Feng ancestor did not dare to unleash his full Spirit Power outside the Yin Tomb-Caverns. However, he was confident that shaking off the other's long rope of black qi and then turning back to strike down those five fingernails would be no problem at all. The difference in their levels created a vast disparity in speed.
At the same time, he had nearly reached Fang Guangjun in his flight.
But just as the Feng ancestor was brimming with confidence, he unexpectedly felt a sticky force coming from the long rope of black qi. This force appeared very abruptly. Although it wasn't strong, it was enough to make the Feng ancestor's face change drastically. The slightest deviation could lead to a completely different outcome.
With a surge of magic power from his hand, the crescent spade easily broke free. But just as his Spirit Power flared and he was about to strike the fingernails, five bloody arrows suddenly shot out from the back of Fang Guangjun, who was fleeing desperately ahead.
His flying body froze, and a look of disbelief appeared in his eyes. As he tried to turn his head to look, an extremely muffled word escaped his lips.
"Sen..."
Then, as the five streams of sinister ghost qi entered his body, the poison that had been on the verge of erupting could no longer be suppressed. Fang Guangjun felt the world spin, and he plunged headfirst towards the ground below. A single, unwilling thought lingered in the fragments of his mind.
'Senior, didn't you say that as long as I did it, you would let me go...'
Although he tried his best to scream it out, the moment the first word reached his lips, producing only a muffled sound, his mouth was silently sealed by a powerful force. All his subsequent words were forcefully blocked, and then, boundless darkness engulfed his consciousness.
His falling body was caught by the Feng family's ancestor, who had just arrived.
'This ghostly creature hid its strength!'
This was the Feng ancestor's first thought. The next moment, without even checking Fang Guangjun's condition, his figure flickered and he was already flying rapidly into the distance. He had not wanted to engage in a major battle with this ghostly creature within the Yin Tomb-Caverns in the first place, let alone get entangled in a fight outside of them.
The thin, tall, vicious hag's soul body was also somewhat baffled by the sudden turn of events. Just now, for a fleeting moment, the long rope of black qi she had summoned had felt somewhat out of her control. But before she could react, everything had returned to normal.
'Was it an illusion?'
This thought had just risen when she saw the Feng family's ancestor grab the body of the one who had attacked her lair and swiftly flee into the distance. She followed without hesitation, unaware that Fang Guangjun was already dead, her heart still filled with malice.
However, just as she had flown less than fifty zhang, the vicious hag's soul body felt a heart-palpitating aura brush past her. She was so frightened that she immediately stopped flying. When she cautiously scanned her surroundings, the aura had already vanished without a trace, coming and going like a ghost.
"Has my perception become faulty after this injury?"
She looked around with some confusion. Apart from the mournful, rising and falling cries of ghosts in the distant night, there was nothing else unusual. And in that moment of delay, the Feng family's ancestor had already disappeared from sight.
The vicious hag's soul body's triangular eyes darted around a few times. She still wanted to continue the pursuit, but as soon as she flew forward, that heart-stopping feeling appeared again. She released her Divine Sense to scan the surroundings once more, but it was the same as before.
The vicious hag couldn't help but retreat cautiously. But to her surprise, after she had retreated more than ten zhang, that inexplicable, unnerving palpitation never appeared again. After standing there for a moment, she swiftly flew back towards her lair.
After the surroundings gradually returned to normal, some low-level ghostly creatures slowly began to emerge from the ground again, wandering or drifting aimlessly in the night.
Just then, an extremely faint human figure materialized like one of the ghosts. He stood before a tombstone, looking in the direction where the Feng ancestor had disappeared, and let out a soft chuckle.
"I've done all that should be done. If you don't even dare to open the storage pouch, then you are not fit to be the head of a family. Heh, perhaps because of this, you'll be able to receive quite a few rewards from the Falling Star Valley."
With a low, inaudible chuckle, the extremely faint figure faded back into nothingness. The surrounding ghostly creatures wandered on, among them the resentful thoughts of Fang Guangjun, which lingered and refused to disperse...
Li Yan had not killed Fang Guangjun directly earlier, nor could he. Otherwise, how could Fang Guangjun's death be explained? It would only tell others that a cultivator or ghostly creature of a higher cultivation level existed here. The Feng family would then inevitably report Fang Guangjun's death and their suspicions to the Falling Star Valley. The Valley would likely not rest until the cause was found. For them, no one wanted a being capable of easily killing a Foundation Establishment cultivator lurking nearby.
At the same time, Fang Guangjun absolutely had to die. He had seen some of Li Yan's trump cards, and how could Li Yan allow him to continue living in this world? As for subduing him, Li Yan had no desire to keep such a person by his side. Even with the restriction of a Blood Oath Pact, the thought of someone trading the corpses of human cultivators with foreign races for resources made Li Yan feel somewhat uncomfortable.
Due to various factors, he had to kill Fang Guangjun one way or another. But how could he make everything that happened explainable, without suspicion falling on him? The moment the idea of killing him arose, Li Yan had begun to plan. Finally, when he thought of the ghostly creatures, a plan quickly formed in his mind.
He pretended to agree to Fang Guangjun's offer of allegiance and then dispelled some of the poison gas from his body, allowing him to recover thirty to forty percent of his cultivation.
The poison he had used on Fang Guangjun was just a wisp of "Branches of the Same Breath." This poison spread through the body's various meridians along with the flow of blood, constantly devouring the Spirit Power within the blood, eventually causing the cultivator to lose all magic power and even suffocate to death. Li Yan had truly only released a wisp, afraid of accidentally killing Fang Guangjun. But even this wisp was more than Fang Guangjun could handle.
Li Yan could have completely forced this wisp of poison out of Fang Guangjun's body with his own strength alone, not to mention he had the antidote on him. With these two layers of protection, Li Yan was certain he wouldn't kill Fang Guangjun in the first instance.
Moreover, this poison had another major characteristic: its stealth. Unless you personally watched the poisoned creature die a painful death before your eyes, it would be very difficult to find traces of the poison once the creature was completely dead, as its blood would no longer flow and its Spirit Power would have long since vanished.
Li Yan had always been cautious in his actions. This time, even when dealing with someone of a lower cultivation level, he still carefully calculated every step.
After dispelling some of the potent poison from Fang Guangjun's body, he took him and flew directly towards the tomb of the thin, tall, vicious hag's soul body. He told Fang Guangjun that if he wanted to gain his trust, it was simple: just lure the Foundation Establishment ghostly creature here to the Feng family's ancestor.
Fang Guangjun wanted to ask why, but when he saw Li Yan's emotionless face, he was too terrified to open his mouth. He didn't know what this Zhang Ming was planning, or why he wanted to lure a Foundation Establishment ghostly creature to the Feng family's ancestor.
'Is he trying to kill the Feng family's ancestor?'
But after thinking about it, he felt it was completely unnecessary. With this poison cultivator's methods, killing the Feng family's ancestor would probably be as easy as drinking water. In truth, even if he had asked, Li Yan would have had no answer for him, because Li Yan had no intention of dealing with the Feng ancestor. He also predicted that Fang Guangjun wouldn't dare to ask.
After arriving at the vicious hag's tomb, they reached a random spot, and Li Yan simply sent a punch forward.
Fang Guangjun's heart leaped into his throat. He watched as Zhang Ming's casual, light punch nearly caused the restriction to collapse. It seemed utterly effortless. He had no doubt that this Zhang Ming could easily slaughter everyone in this entire area of Yin Tomb-Caverns.
After throwing the punch, Li Yan himself had vanished into thin air. No matter how Fang Guangjun spread his Divine Sense, he couldn't find him. If he didn't know that Zhang Ming certainly hadn't left, he might have already started thinking about escaping.
Subsequently, the scene of the Feng family's ancestor coming to the rescue occurred.
What made Fang Guangjun unwilling to accept his death was that when he was struck by the Foundation Establishment ghostly creature, he finally realized that Zhang Ming had never intended to let him go. Otherwise, with his strength, how could he have been killed by a mere Foundation Establishment ghostly creature?
What he didn't know was that even the single word he had managed to cry out was deliberately allowed by Li Yan. The vicious hag was no stronger than Fang Guangjun; even her most powerful attack shouldn't have been able to kill him instantly. It was only natural for him to make a sound.
On his way back, the Feng family's ancestor immediately contacted Feng Zaiyu. Although he felt the sting of using the precious Voice Transmission Talisman, he couldn't let what happened to Fang Guangjun be known by others just yet. He needed to understand the whole story first. The entire affair had taken him no more than a few dozen breaths. The disciples he had sent out had probably not even reached Feng Zaiyu's location yet. He had no choice but to contact Feng Zaiyu himself.
If a Foundation Establishment cultivator had an accident under the Feng family's watch, they would not be able to bear the thunderous wrath of the Falling Star Valley.
The moment he caught Fang Guangjun's body, the Feng ancestor's Divine Sense had immediately swept over it. But what made his heart turn to ice was that Fang Guangjun's aura was completely gone. His divine soul had dissipated in an instant.
On this point, the Feng ancestor was indeed suspicious. After checking Fang Guangjun's body several times with his Divine Sense, he only found it shrouded in a dense, sinister ghost qi. In the end, he could only conclude that the vicious hag's cultivation was not high, but her techniques were incomparably insidious and venomous. This also made him wary of the vicious hag, thinking he would have to deal with this ghostly creature carefully in the future.
On the way, he learned that everything was going smoothly on Feng Zaiyu's side. They had already reached the Foundation Establishment ghostly creature's lair and had discovered a huge blood pool. The Feng ancestor was slightly relieved at first, but his joy at obtaining the blood pool had mostly vanished. This Fang Guangjun had snuck out on his own, and Feng Zaiyu had no idea where this "Senior Fang" was now.
Soon, the Feng ancestor returned to the tomb where he had already laid the formation. The Feng family disciples had all left, which was exactly the environment he needed.
After placing Fang Guangjun's corpse flat on the ground, the Feng ancestor began to examine it once more. The thick, sinister death qi in Fang Guangjun's body was the most obvious sign of an attack by a ghostly creature. His body was as if it had lain in a tomb for several hundred years. The Feng ancestor was all too familiar with this.
Other than that, Fang Guangjun only had some external injuries. The corrosive power on those wounds was very obvious and should have been caused by the attack of that Foundation Establishment ghostly creature. But those wounds were not enough to take the life of a Foundation Establishment cultivator.
"Why did he go looking for that ghostly creature alone? Moreover, judging from my conversation with him during the day, this Fellow Daoist Fang is an experienced and seasoned person. Why would he go alone when he clearly knew his strength was inferior to the other's? Was his goal the ghostly creature itself, or did he discover something about it?"
Question after question plagued the Feng family's ancestor. He did not believe Fang Guangjun was a reckless person; he was completely certain of this. But everything that had happened now was incredibly bizarre, leaving him unable to figure it out.
As the Feng ancestor was lost in thought, his expression suddenly changed. With a great wave of his sleeve, he swept Fang Guangjun's corpse on the ground into his storage pouch.