Li Yan was in the prime of his life. As a powerful body cultivator, his desires in certain aspects were actually several times stronger than other cultivators.
In addition, he and Gong Chenying already had a Dao Companion agreement. Being with her, his state of mind was inevitably different, and his mind was no longer so tense.
The touch of her black hair on the tip of his nose, the faint fragrance entering his nostrils, in that one moment, Li Yan was actually a little lost.
Fortunately, Li Yan's concentration had always been extremely strong. In just a moment, he realized his mistake and quickly held his breath and focused his mind.
As the Gui Water True Scripture circulated rapidly, a wave of coolness shot straight to the crown of his head. Instantly, his turbulent thoughts returned to normal.
When he looked at the beautiful woman's cold and stunning profile again, Li Yan's eyes were clear.
It had only been a brief moment, but Gong Chenying still sensed something unusual. When she quickly turned to look at Li Yan, she saw a pair of clear, black-and-white eyes staring at her.
Being stared at like this by Li Yan, Gong Chenying couldn't help but blush.
"What... what are you looking at?"
"I'm looking at the Qing A Wang's wife!"
Li Yan replied.
"Oh!"
Gong Chenying had already looked away. She let out a soft "oh" and looked elsewhere again, although it was a patch of darkness there.
Seeing her respond like that, Li Yan was a little surprised. He couldn't help but compare her to Zhao Min.
If he had said that to Zhao Min before they became Dao Companions, although she had already given her heart to him, she would surely have nudged him with her elbow in a fit of shyness or a light snort!
But Gong Chenying's appearance, cold and stunning yet with a girlish tranquility, no one would have thought that once she fought with someone, she would be devastating, swift as fire, and unmovable as a mountain!
The two of them continued to sink like this. Apart from Li Yan's teasing when his mind was wandering, both of them were of a quiet disposition. For a while, they were both focused on the changes around them.
Even two Nascent Soul cultivators had entered here and never came out. To say that Li Yan was not nervous would be a lie.
After knowing the news of Gong Shanhe's disappearance, although Gong Chenying had not asked Li Yan to do anything, with Li Yan's understanding of her, she would definitely go out to search as soon as she had a chance.
Li Yan had learned from Zhao Min that Gong Chenying's mother had perished in a battle with the Wind Beasts when she was only a few years old. In Gong Chenying's heart, Gong Shanhe was both a father and a mother, her closest blood relative in this world.
Therefore, even knowing that even Nascent Soul cultivators would perish here, Li Yan still took the initiative to bring it up. This was also his promise from back then. Although he couldn't accompany Gong Chenying back to the Tianli Clan, he would do everything in his power to help her.
The further down he sank, the more Li Yan's mood sank.
'It's already been about half an hour. Although I haven't sped up, the surrounding mud offers no resistance at all, and the descent speed itself is not slow at all.'
'My senior sister and I are like two stubborn rocks falling in a straight line. By my calculation, it's been at least ten thousand zhang, and the surroundings are still empty in my Divine Sense...'
Just then, Gong Chenying suddenly spoke.
"I feel like there's Sky Eye Wind here!"
"You're saying there's Sky Eye Wind here?"
Li Yan couldn't help but look at Gong Chenying in surprise. As Gong Chenying released her Divine Sense, her beautiful eyes were constantly sizing up the pitch-black surroundings.
In Li Yan's view, this was essentially meaningless. Even if a cultivator's eyesight was extremely strong, they could only see a greyish, misty area nearby, which was the swamp mud. But it was no match for Divine Sense at all.
Gong Chenying said she felt the presence of Sky Eye Wind. Li Yan was surprised, firstly, because his Divine Sense had not detected anything.
Secondly, this was underground in a boundless swamp. If there was Sky Eye Wind, wouldn't this mud be swept into the sky? Or under the churning power of the sky wind, at least the surface of the swamp lake would also be churning with mud, but this place was completely calm.
"You're using Divine Sense, I'm relying on feeling. Although this is still a patch of mud, as it flows slowly, there are symptoms of the 'Inverted Vortex' formed by the Sky Eye Wind."
"This 'Inverted Vortex' can allow the wind pillars in a 'Heaven's Eye Pit' to cancel each other's power, making it very difficult for them to easily rise to the top of the 'Heaven's Eye Pit.'"
"Instead, they will keep gathering power at the bottom until they have accumulated enough power that the 'Inverted Vortex' can no longer stop them. Only then will they break through and fly out of the 'Heaven's Eye Pit,' forming what people on the ground call the 'Sky Eye Wind'!"
Gong Chenying still stared seriously at the surroundings. Her crimson lips parted slightly as she briefly explained the situation to Li Yan.
"Inverted Vortex? Accumulated enough power that can't be stopped? You're saying this is also a 'Heaven's Eye Pit,' and there are actually wind pillars here already, but their power has been canceled out to almost nothing?"
Li Yan was shocked. He still believed Gong Chenying's explanation that she could see the "Inverted Vortex." After all, the Tianli Clan had been dealing with these things for generations.
In his eyes, the pitch-black mud that was being held back by the spiritual power shield and flowing slowly around them seemed to be unchanging. But Gong Chenying could discern the mystery within.
But for Gong Chenying to say that this might be a "Heaven's Eye Pit," that was what shocked Li Yan.
What was this thing? It was the greatest natural disaster on the Wind God Continent, and also a place where Wind Beasts could be born.
"I don't think I'm mistaken. I'm about... about sixty to seventy percent sure. This might be one of the reasons why Father and the Sixth Elder are trapped here."
"'Heaven's Eye Pits,' although the creatures on the Wind God Continent have dealt with them for generations, their mystery and terror, we still haven't explored much! We also don't know how they are formed."
Gong Chenying continued, but when determining the "Inverted Vortex" she had identified, perhaps wanting to confirm carefully, she was still staring ahead.
"I wonder if a 'Sky Eye Wind' has ever erupted from the ground here before, and if there are any Wind Beasts in the swamp?"
Li Yan also carefully distinguished the black mud outside the spiritual power shield, but still couldn't see any pattern. He could only continue to ask Gong Chenying.
"No!"
This time, Gong Chenying's answer was very straightforward.
Li Yan nodded. With Gong Chenying's status, if a "Sky Eye Wind" had appeared here, it should have been recorded in the Tianli Clan's scriptures, and she would definitely know.
What's more, this place was still within the sphere of influence of the two Wind Beast clans. If other Wind Beasts appeared here, they would attack immediately, and that kind of commotion would definitely not be hidden from the Tianli Clan cultivators.
"Then it seems the power of this 'Heaven's Eye Pit' is not very great. It's either newly formed, or it was abandoned a long, long time ago, even in ancient times."
"Otherwise, how could it not accumulate enough power to break through the 'Inverted Vortex,' and appear completely silent from the outside."
After thinking, Li Yan gave his opinion.
"I think it's probably the former. Who knows how many years this swamp has existed here. Whether it's our clan or the experts among the Wind Beasts, they would have left some records. The records I've seen don't mention any 'Heaven's Eye Pit.'"
"Father and the Great Elder and the others also came here a long, long time ago, and I didn't hear them say there was anything special about this place back then."
"On the contrary, the last time Father and the Sixth Elder left the clan, I don't know why they came here again, and in the end, they couldn't get out."
After making this discovery, Gong Chenying had been frowning in thought. As the two of them asked and answered, they continued to sink.
Suddenly, Li Yan's expression moved slightly, and then he closed his eyes. Seeing this, Gong Chenying immediately stopped talking and waited quietly.
Just a few breaths later, Li Yan opened his eyes and looked at Gong Chenying.
"You're right. There's a hollow below, and there are indeed wind pillars emitting a yin-cold aura churning inside, but they can't break through the mud layer above."
"This situation is somewhat similar to the wind pillars I've seen inside a 'Heaven's Eye Pit.' It might be that the 'Inverted Vortex' you mentioned has canceled out their power!"
A few dozen breaths later, Gong Chenying's Divine Sense also discovered the scene Li Yan had described.
Another fifty-odd breaths later, Li Yan and Gong Chenying, wrapped in a spiritual power shield, were already hovering above a huge pit.
There was actually a trace of light here, but this light could only be distinguished by cultivators. The surroundings were dark grey, no longer pitch black.
Looking down at the pit, one could not see the edge at all. Even without using his Divine Sense to probe, Li Yan could roughly guess that the range of the pit was not much different from the swamp lake surface above, which meant that the range of the pit below could be as large as ten thousand li.
Above their heads was a churning layer of mud, but this mud could not fall. It was held up by the residual wind from the churning wind pillars in the pit.
And the churning mud above only extended upward for a few dozen li before becoming completely calm, like a dead prison.
Li Yan felt the impact of the yin-cold, fierce wind on the spiritual power shield around him. He looked up again at the pitch-black mud being held up by the wind in the pit. He still couldn't understand why this mud had no force at all.
"Where do we go down from!"
Li Yan asked Gong Chenying. At this time, Gong Chenying had also retracted her Divine Sense. In her blue robes and arrow sleeves, with a long spear on her back, her slender figure looked exceptionally heroic and imposing.
"It's the same for a few thousand li around. I can't see anything special either. It's just that the 'Sky Eye Wind' here is yin-cold, different from any I've seen before."
"It should just be a different form of 'Sky Eye Wind.' The 'Sky Eye Winds' on the Wind God Continent are sometimes scorching and violent, sometimes as sharp as arrows, sometimes like the Nine Springs Underworld, and some can dissolve flesh and blood..."
"So, apart from this, we don't need to consider it. It's the same no matter where we go down. Within the range of my Divine Sense, the 'Sky Eye Wind' I can see won't have any effect on your spiritual power shield."
"Unless you can sense a place where the wind pillar's power is weaker than here, that might be a more suitable place to go down."
"For the rest, we can only take it one step at a time. As long as it's a place we haven't been to, no one can know what will happen in the next moment."
Gong Chenying looked at Li Yan.
"In my Divine Sense, the power of the wind pillars in other areas is similar to here, so there's really no need to choose. Alright then, let's go down from here!"