Bao Ruijie lifted his blade and stepped towards the ordinary man one step at a time.
"Hungry Ghost Path! Appear!"
With a roar of anger, Han Yu waved his hand, and a gigantic Hungry Ghost Image gradually emerged behind him.
Seeing the ordinary man and his cousin both in trouble, with Ran Shiqing watching intently from the side, Han Yu could no longer care about anything else.
Countless skeleton hungry ghosts slowly crawled up from the mountain, ready to surge out of the image.
"Divine Techniques!"
Ran Shiqing, who was about to approach, quickly retreated several steps, his face showing a complex expression of fear and jealousy.
Divine Techniques surpass Ultimate Techniques!
Ultimate Techniques are moves created by cultivators after gaining some enlightenment during cultivation, consuming a large amount of True Essence to unleash powerful strength. However, beyond this power, there is another force known as Divine Techniques.
They possess all sorts of marvelous and unpredictable abilities, potentially wielding terrifying destructive power.
Without understanding the characteristics of Divine Techniques, no one dares to act rashly.
The crucial point that made Ran Shiqing so jealous was that most Divine Techniques are born from the natural gifts of a very few cultivators, emerging as they enter the path of cultivation. Very few others can achieve it through postnatal cultivation, but that requires individuals of extraordinary talent, spending decades of effort to accomplish.
"Truly damnable."
Ran Shiqing gritted his teeth and cursed, his face twisted with jealousy.
Meanwhile, not far away, his half-dead cousin forgot about his injuries, staring dumbfoundedly at Han Yu.
"He learned it just by looking at the image once?"
He could only assume that Han Yu learned it from the visualization image in the tomb.
At that moment, hundreds of skeletons emerged first, sweeping towards the Zuyou Sect, waving bone blades or baring fangs and claws...
Bao Ruijie's face was grave as he continuously retreated, no longer bothering to trouble the ordinary man.
"Run quickly, the Pharmacist's Hungry Ghost Path doesn't have eyes; it doesn't distinguish between friend and foe." His cousin weakly shouted to the ordinary man.
The ordinary man, however, seemed oblivious, gritting his teeth and limping over to laboriously pull his cousin up.
"I wonder if my single leg is agile enough."
The ordinary man joked painfully, then with a laugh, grabbed his cousin and began to ascend into the air, struggling with his single leg to step three times before crashing heavily down again.
Luckily, they landed not far behind Han Yu.
The mouth of the valley echoed with sounds of slaughter and continuous wailing.
The disciples of the Zuyou Sect stood back-to-back against each other but still couldn't withstand the assault of the bone hordes. Whenever one was pulled out of the circle by a skeleton hungry ghost, countless others would quickly pile on.
The Corpse King barely held on with its powerful body, but this only attracted more hungry ghosts, each rushing forward, eventually tearing the Corpse King's limbs apart...
In just a moment, the remaining disciples were completely slaughtered, and the skeleton hungry ghosts began searching for new targets, soon setting their sights on Bao Ruijie and Ran Shiqing.
They clattered their teeth up and down as if communicating something, then turned and rushed over together.
Bao Ruijie's face was pale; he involuntarily moved closer to Ran Shiqing, feeling somewhat safer this way.
The sect's disciples had died too tragically, each one a bloody mess, some with arms stripped to the bone, others with legs, and some even more gruesomely stripped of half their flesh.
Seeing the hungry ghosts surge like a tide, Ran Shiqing waved and gripped a three-foot long blade, slashing it fiercely into the bone tide. The immense aura surged forward, instantly obliterating over half the bone tide.
It's effective! Ran Shiqing's brows relaxed, and Bao Ruijie's eyes lit up as well, drawing his blade to protect himself. But before he could celebrate for long, another batch of hungry ghosts stepped out.
"Why are only so few coming out each time?"
Han Yu furrowed his brow. Clearly, behind him, the Hungry Ghost Path was filled with piled up white bones, yet fewer than a hundred hungry ghosts could hold the stalemate. In this short time, Ran Shiqing had already cleared the third wave of hungry ghosts.
"Your Sea of Consciousness's Spiritual Power is insufficient to fully unleash the Hungry Ghost Path. Maintaining around a hundred is already your limit, and besides, you're already exhausted." Glass urgently said in his mind.
As soon as the words fell, a deep fatigue overwhelmed him. Han Yu felt a stabbing pain in his mind, and the Hungry Ghost Image behind him instantly collapsed. The wave of skeletons attacking paused in place and disappeared in the blink of an eye.
"It seems your power is insufficient to unleash your Divine Techniques."
Ran Shiqing smiled, his eyes cold.
Han Yu was in a panic, internally dialoguing.
"Hurry, think of something, any pills with minimal side effects?"
"I'm thinking, don't rush."
Han Yu was annoyed; it was a matter of life and death—how could he not be anxious?
Huff~ Wheeze~
Suddenly, the Glazed Bottle shook violently, then spat out a pill.
"At a time like this, Ping, don't mess around!" Glass scolded the Glazed Bottle angrily.
Han Yu suddenly paused, then his face was filled with overwhelming joy!
"Ping, well done!"
Explosive God Pill: Upon consumption, the Sea of Consciousness erupts within a quarter-hour, unleashing endless Spiritual Power that must be released timely, or else the Sea of Consciousness will explode, leaving the consumer a living corpse. Side effect: The Sea of Consciousness becomes void for three days, akin to an infant.
Three days, not a concern!
Han Yu gritted his teeth, quickly retrieving the Explosive God Pill from his mind, and hurriedly swallowed it.
"Don't let him recover, quickly restrain him!"
Ran Shiqing saw Han Yu take the pill and assumed it was for recovery, so he hastily instructed Bao Ruijie.
Bao Ruijie showed hesitation but did not dare disobey, taking a step forward and then leaping towards Han Yu.
After swallowing the pill, a burning sensation instantly spread through Han Yu's body, as if endless energy was churning in his mind.
"Hungry Ghost Path! Appear again!"
Han Yu roared, and the giant Hungry Ghost Image reappeared behind him. Bao Ruijie leaped in front, only to be pushed back by the surging tide of white bones, and he remained steady with a sharp pain underfoot.
Somehow, several white bones had already gnawed the flesh off one of his legs.
"Ah!"
Bao Ruijie screamed miserably, using his remaining leg to propel himself away, then tumbled back to Ran Shiqing, rolling and crawling.
This time, the Hungry Ghosts swarmed mountains and plains, eager to break into the world beyond the image, and an endless tide of white bones rushed towards the two.
Ran Shiqing's body flickered with golden light, forcibly protecting himself with True Essence as blade qi erupted. After several cuts, he was horrified to discover this time's Hungry Ghost tide seemed endless.
Soon, the entire valley entry was filled with Hungry Ghosts, densely packed, looking terrifyingly creepy.
In a few blinks, Ran Shiqing was submerged by the white ocean, occasionally revealing flashes of light, along with Bao Ruijie's agonizing screams.
"Is he really that terrifying?"
Commoners were horrified beyond belief, the cousin was equally shocked.
"I don't know where Yi Xian pulled out this freak."
The cousin shook his head dumbfoundedly.
"It's bad."
The commoner's face suddenly changed dramatically, as the increasing Hungry Ghosts left nowhere to step and gradually approached them.
At this moment, a group of Hungry Ghosts had their eyes on them.
"Hold on to me."
The commoner gritted his teeth, supporting the cousin to once again leap into the air with one leg. Injecting True Essence underneath, they flew forward several meters then stomped again, both crashing onto mid-air rock faces.
Clinging tightly to a protruding cliff, they slowly heaved a sigh of relief.
Looking down from above, only Han Yu stood alone in the center, surrounded by a white ocean.
A quarter-hour later, the white bones dispersed, revealing a silhouette, blood and flesh blurred, gasping continually—half the face still barely recognizable as Ran Shiqing, the other half gruesomely torn away.
The hand holding the blade was now left with only white bones, while Bao Ruijie had disappeared entirely, leaving just a pile of bones with meat scraps underfoot.
"Hungry Ghost Path!"
Han Yu waved and shouted again, terror filled Ran Shiqing's face, not daring to stay any longer. In panic, he summoned a long blade, and vanished into the dust stepping on the blade...
Pian Stone Ridge!
Ran Shiqing rolled on the ground, staggered back on his feet, and stumbled toward his farmhouse.
Right now he needed to heal as quickly as possible, having lost a large portion of his flesh, he was on the brink of collapse and could faint at any moment.
Strenuously opening a small courtyard door, he changed expression immediately as he entered.
Inside the courtyard, a pitch-black figure stood quietly, completely cloaked in a black cape hiding its face.
"Ve... Venerate."
Ran Shiqing stuttered calling out.
"You didn't accomplish your task?"
The shadow's voice was cold and indifferent, making Ran Shiqing's heart leap in fear.
"There was a tough young person with a strong body and Hungry Ghost Path divine techniques, I was caught off guard..." Ran Shiqing hurriedly explained.
"But Bao Ruijie is dead, leaving no survivors there."
The black figure looked down in silence, finally raising its head slowly.
"No, there's still a survivor."
Despair filled Ran Shiqing's eyes, retreating continuously...