At the same time, Zhang Ling, guided by the Yin spirits within the Soul Banner, entered a cavern. The cave was cold and damp, with a pitted and uneven stone floor and the constant dripping of water from above.
The same heavy Yin energy mist permeated the cave.
Suddenly, he stopped, noticing that the main passage ahead was blocked by a pile of rocks. Cold drafts blew out from the gaps between the stones, indicating more space beyond.
He realized these rocks weren't the result of a natural collapse, but rather damage from cultivator combat, as the rocks were quite new.
Without Zhang Ling needing to act, the Twin-Tailed Cat meowed and darted forward, instantly growing to ten feet in size. With each swing of its two tails, it launched massive fireballs.
After a series of loud explosions, the obstructing rocks were blasted into rubble.
Continuing onward, Zhang Ling discovered several Gloomgrass and Frostjade Flowers growing in the rock crevices. Both were grade-two spirit herbs of the Yin-cold attribute. They held some value for ordinary cultivators, but were of little use to him.
He casually picked them.
After about a quarter of an hour, he reached the end of the passage. There was no path forward, only an underground cliff. The opposite cliff face was thirty to forty feet away, seemingly a natural fault in the mountain.
He emerged from a small cave on the cliff wall. Countless similar openings dotted the cliff face. The opposite cliff was the same, riddled with holes of various sizes.
Zhang Ling paid little attention to the surroundings, instead looking down the cliff. The Yin energy was thick below; if there was a Yin vein, the core region would be there.
The intensity of the Yin energy felt no weaker than a mid-grade spirit vein. This environment likely gave birth to Yin-cold attribute spiritual objects. The Netherfire he collected before was born from this kind of Yin fire environment.
Without hesitation, Zhang Ling pointed at the Soul Banner fluttering beside him. The artifact shook, releasing a cloud of grey mist that enveloped him and the Twin-Tailed Cat as they descended the cliff.
After falling a thousand feet, they landed on a large rock. He released his divine sense to scan the area.
There was some light below, revealing crystals that emitted a dim glow. However, they contained little spiritual power, just ordinary crystals.
Besides discovering some low-level spiritual herbs, there was nothing else.
The environment below was also complex, with numerous caves in the surrounding rock walls. Some were winding and interconnected, while others were shallow.
Zhang Ling couldn't explore the entire area at once. But he didn't need to; his goal was to find the area with the densest Yin energy.
Suddenly, he spat out a mouthful of essence blood, which transformed into a fist-sized cloud of blood mist. He chanted an incantation, and his hands danced, forming over a dozen strange hand seals that he pressed into the blood essence.
The Soul Banner also swayed a few times, releasing a blurry grey-black wolf head, the strongest of the main souls within the artifact.
The wolf head absorbed the essence blood, bathing its entire form in a layer of bloody light. Then, a crack opened on the top of its head, and the scarlet light, like a stream, surged into the opening as if it had found an outlet.
A bizarre scene unfolded as the crack on the wolf head blinked a few times like an eyelid, then solidified into a blood-red single eye.
"Spirit Vision Eye, a secret technique from the Underworld Monarch Art. It can be cast with the help of high-level ghost spirits to search for special spiritual objects," Zhang Ling chuckled, looking at the single eye on the wolf head.
This was a type of spiritual eye ability, similar to the Heavenly Eye Technique used by cultivators, but of a much higher level.
Over the past two years, in order to collect and find Yin-attribute spirit fire, he had specifically practiced this secret technique. This place, with its dense Yin energy, was perfect for casting the spell.
Zhang Ling issued a command, and the ghostly eye on the wolf head mechanically rotated a few times before fixing on a direction and flying off.
The Spirit Vision Eye had many wonderful uses. According to the Underworld Monarch Art, once this divine ability was mastered, it could not only see through most illusions, but also cast ghost illusion-type divine abilities.
Right now, the Spirit Vision Eye on the wolf head was just a low-level version he had managed to cast using a clever method and the help of a high-level ghost. It could only display a fraction of its power and was only used to search for Yin-attribute items.
After all, he didn't mainly cultivate this technique.
After searching for a while, the wolf head suddenly howled, and the ghostly eye on its head turned to look at a red plant growing in a rock crevice a few dozen feet away.
Zhang Ling also looked over and immediately recognized it as a grade-four Red Ice Flower, also a Yin-cold attribute spiritual herb. It was extremely precious, as this spiritual flower could be used to refine pills that repaired the divine soul.
The Red Ice Flower was entirely black, with several large leaves, and stood about ten feet tall like a stalk of wheat. At the top, it bloomed with several scarlet flowers, all covered in a layer of solid ice, like an ice sculpture.
Zhang Ling took a few steps forward and reached out his left hand, seemingly wanting to pluck the Red Ice Flower.
As he approached the Red Ice Flower, the spiritual flower swayed a few times, and one of the flowers at the top fell off. Strangely, the flower didn't fall to the ground, but spun in the air and floated towards his body.
Zhang Ling remained unmoved, his eyes turning cold, his expression unchanging. He flicked his left hand, and a slender grey-green vine shot out, transforming into countless dense grey-green threads that quickly wove into a web, trapping the spiritual flower.
But the trapped flower seemed to have a will of its own, becoming illusory and transforming into a small black snake with a strange flash, darting left and right.
Zhang Ling gently clenched his hand, and the web of threads flashed with azure and crimson spiritual light, contracting.
"Ah, Daoist, spare me!" The black snake revealed a look of terror and cried out in an extremely intelligent voice, conveying an urgent plea.
Zhang Ling narrowed his eyes and immediately cast a Soul-Searching Technique.
The black snake screamed and struggled desperately. On closer inspection, a blurry human face appeared on the snake's head, filled with fear.
After a moment, the soul search was complete. Zhang Ling clapped his hand and retracted the vines. The human face on the black snake's head was dull and lifeless, having lost consciousness, and floated in mid-air without trying to escape.
The wolf head, however, unceremoniously spat out a gust of Yin wind, which enveloped the black snake and sucked it into its mouth. This black snake was a rare Charm Spirit.
A Charm Spirit was a special type of ghost, extremely skilled in illusionary divine abilities. It was a ghost with extremely high potential.
This black snake's spiritual power wasn't high, only at the fourth level. It wasn't considered a high-level ghost, but its illusionary divine abilities had almost deceived his divine sense.
Turning his head, he saw that the Red Ice Flower growing on the rock wall had transformed into an ordinary grade-two Gloomgrass.
If it hadn't been for the ghostly eye on the wolf head sensing that the spiritual herb's aura was a bit strange, he would have been tricked. If an ordinary cultivator had rashly picked the Red Ice Flower, they would have been possessed by the remnant soul attached to this Charm Spirit.
This was why Zhang Ling had unceremoniously cast the Soul-Searching Technique.
The remnant soul attached to the Charm Spirit was the human face that had appeared earlier. It was the remnant soul of a cultivator named Chen.
This person, Chen Guang, had the strength of a late-stage Golden Core cultivator. A day ago, he had come here with several fellow cultivators to explore. They encountered a large number of Yin spirits and zombie monsters. They were no match and were all killed. Only this Chen escaped with his spirit soul and cleverly avoided disaster with the help of this Charm Spirit pet.
But having lost his physical body and having used several secret techniques to escape, his remnant soul was in terrible condition. He temporarily possessed the black snake Charm Spirit and hid here to recuperate. After hiding for several hours, he barely stabilized his spirit soul.
But just now, a wave of divine sense swept over. He was shocked and immediately realized that a cultivator had arrived.
This Chen, instead of rushing to hide, came up with the idea of seizing the person who came.
Therefore, he let the Charm Spirit transform an ordinary spiritual grass into a Red Ice Flower to attract the attention of the person who came.
The power of divine sense that swept over was naturally released by Zhang Ling. He had just casually scanned the surroundings to prevent sudden danger.
After searching the soul and getting these details, Zhang Ling smiled, shook his head, and continued to explore the area. This was just a small episode, and he didn't care.
This person actually wanted to seize him, which naturally wouldn't succeed.
Even if he was careless for a while and didn't see through this person's hiding, there wouldn't be any danger if he really picked the Red Ice Flower. The remnant soul of a Golden Core cultivator couldn't possibly seize a Nascent Soul cultivator like him.
At this moment, he learned some information about this place instead.
This Chen cultivator was not a rogue cultivator, but belonged to the Heavenly Wind Tribe. Coincidentally, this person was the closed-door disciple of the mid-Nascent Soul stage maniac, Old Freak Gale.
The situation in the Myriad Caves Mountains had attracted the attention of nearby forces. Old Freak Gale sent this person with several cultivators to explore the area.
Unexpectedly, Chen cultivator's team was completely wiped out, and this person was left with only his remnant soul. Now that this person had been searched by him, his remnant soul had been swallowed and had already vanished into thin air. It may have alarmed that Old Freak Gale.
Zhang Ling was not worried at all about this Nascent Soul cultivator coming over.
The Heavenly Wind Tribe was quite far from here, tens of thousands of miles away. Even if the mid-Nascent Soul stage old freak rushed over now, it would take a day. By then, he would have already left.
Zhang Ling was now thinking about the fact that he had been down here for a while, but he hadn't encountered any Yin spirits or fierce ghosts. But according to the information he got from the soul search, Chen cultivator had previously encountered at least a dozen high-level ghosts and zombies.
With a thought, he suddenly changed direction and flew towards the place where this Chen cultivator had encountered danger.
The underground space was very large, with dark caves and cliffs everywhere. It seemed that the entire underground was like this. Before long, Zhang Ling flew more than ten miles and saw a huge pit.
This was a huge pit similar to a volcanic crater, with no end in sight.
Scanning with his divine sense, Zhang Ling checked and found that the diameter of the pit was a hundred miles wide. But the depth was not very deep, only about two hundred feet deep.
The bottom of the pit was piled with rubble, looking like it had been smashed down hard by something, forming the landscape.
Chen cultivator and the others encountered danger below.
Zhang Ling checked around and found no traces of ancient cultivator buildings. But the Yin energy in the pit was very strong, so he no longer hesitated and went down into it.
After a quick search, he found several battlefields where cultivators had fought, and also found some broken pieces of magic weapons. He also found the remains of several corpses of corpse monsters that had been killed, and the broken corpses of cultivators. But he did not find the storage bags of these people.
At the same time, he also found several underground passages paved with huge stone slabs in the rubble. These obvious architectural traces made Zhang Ling realize that there might be a relic under the rubble.
Seeing this, he became a little interested instead.
With a chuckle, Zhang Ling used the earth escape technique and traveled directly through the earth and rocks, intending to check it out. If it was really an ancient cultivator relic, he might get some benefits.
Although his purpose here was to find Yin spirit fire, since he encountered an ancient cultivator relic, he couldn't help but explore it.
As for the possible danger, Zhang Ling didn't care too much. Many Golden Core cultivators could come to this place. He had checked around just now and hadn't encountered any powerful restrictions. Even if he really encountered danger, he would be able to deal with it.
This was not his arrogance. His current cultivation level was already not weak, and he also had the Xuan Turtle controlled by the second soul. Unless he was unlucky enough to encounter some ancient restrictions or a late-stage Nascent Soul stage expert, other dangers were no longer a concern.
Before long, Zhang Ling's eyes lit up, and he passed through a pile of rubble and arrived in a dimly lit tunnel. Looking left and right, he noticed that this tunnel looked ordinary, but there were still some traces of spiritual power fluctuations remaining.
There was metal attribute spiritual power, some demonic energy, and a faint mixture of thunder and fire attribute spiritual power.
This spiritual power was obviously not released by one cultivator, meaning that at least several cultivators had used their means in this tunnel not long ago.
The Yin energy here was strong, and some spiritual power fluctuations of cultivators could still remain. Then the cultivators who fought here must have just left. The time would never exceed a quarter of an hour.
Sensing for a moment, a strong gust of Yin wind was floating in the tunnel on the left, and the Yin energy was stronger. Zhang Ling shook his body and went to explore in that direction.
After passing through a short distance, his expression suddenly changed, and he stopped. The divine sense he released saw a very large space in front of him.
At this moment, a one-sided and tragic massacre was taking place there.
The space there was very large, with a strange bronze giant door. In front of the giant door, more than a dozen corpse monsters full of evil spirit were pouncing. Each of them was a high-level zombie comparable to a Golden Core cultivator.
Zhang Ling was surprised to see so many high-level zombies at once. But what made his face even more gloomy was that there was a strange gust of Yin wind in front of these zombies, and a huge ghost was hidden inside, trapping and killing several cultivators.
There seemed to be three cultivators in the Yin wind. Before he could see who they were, the three cultivators were killed by the ghost.
Zhang Ling's divine sense condensed, and he instantly noticed that the aura of the ghost hidden in the Yin wind was no weaker than that of an early-stage Nascent Soul cultivator. It was actually a Nascent Soul level ghost.
At this moment, the scene he saw was exactly the scene before the death of the Four Wolf Mountain Friends.
