With several ideas already forming in his mind, Ye Chen turned to Li Yan and smiled. "What are you standing around for? Attack the Tiemu Demon Tree with everything you've got." "Attack it?" Li Yan's expression froze at the command. She glanced toward the Tiemu Demon Tree, its branches now thrashing wildly through the air, deflecting every one of Ye Chen's sword strikes. She genuinely didn't know whether she should attack the demon or simply turn and run. "Are you insane? Completely insane!" Fang Huan, watching Ye Chen's actions and hearing his orders, couldn't hold back. "You've lost your mind! Telling us to fight this demon — do you even hear yourself?! Are you trying to get us all killed?!" "Why?" Ye Chen replied calmly, pointing toward the herbs and Tianling fruits growing across the island. "Don't you want what's on that island?" When Li Yan and the others followed where he was pointing, hesitation crept into their expressions. Because at the end of the day, the entire reason

"Nine Revolutions Soul Grass..." Ye Chen finally understood what kind of treasure the Immortal Fairy Sangguan had been after in this place. Not just anything — it was the Nine Revolutions Soul Grass. A natural treasure of immense value to Golden Core seniors and even Nascent Soul Patriarchs, used to cleanse and refine their Primordial Souls. The Nine Revolutions Soul Grass was also known as the Nascent Soul Formation Grass, because it could help any Golden Core cultivator purify and shape their Primordial Soul in preparation for breaking through to form the Nascent Soul. Even a Nascent Soul Patriarch could still make use of it to cleanse and strengthen their own Primordial Soul. It was a genuinely rare treasure — because to be truly usable, it needed to be at least a thousand years old. One hundred years to grow a single leaf, and nine hundred years to form nine leaves arranged in a ring. A full thousand years before it would finally ripen into a usable rare ingredient. Ye

Not long after Li Yan's group departed, a figure dropped from above at tremendous speed and crashed down onto the island. "Boom!" The impact was hard enough to make the entire island tremble. Han Chengyang, the one who had arrived, looked around with a deep frown creasing his brow. "What happened here?" Taking in the destruction and the complete absence of every herb on the small island, Han Chengyang's expression darkened considerably. The Tianwu Sect disciples who had arrived just behind him stood in silence, exchanging uneasy glances. "Search this place immediately! Look for a purple snail that appears completely ordinary!" Panic and fury bleeding into his voice, Han Chengyang shouted the order at them. Not daring to refuse, the disciples accompanying him fanned out and began combing the entire island. After some time, however, they returned with furrowed expressions — somewhere between confused and deeply worried. "Well?" Seeing them hesitate, Han Chengyang snapped. "The

Not someone unknown. Jin Shang, this was the man Ye Chen had once seen at the Taoling Temple. The founder of the Taoling Temple, the place where Guo Biyun had once dedicated her life to serving the common people and ordinary mortals — before that monk had met his end at the hands of his own greed upon catching sight of Ye Chen's storage pouch. But what Ye Chen had seen back then was a portrait, Jin Shang's image on a memorial tablet. A figure regarded as the founding patriarch of the Taoling Temple, who had supposedly departed or passed away an untold number of years ago. Now, watching Jin Shang appear before him in the flesh, Ye Chen knew with certainty that this mysterious monk was anything but ordinary. Even though Ye Chen could sense his cultivation registering at the twelfth level of Qi Refinement, he was equally certain the monk was concealing his true strength. Because going by the history of the Taoling Temple, the place had been established at least a hundred years ago.

"Ye Chen?!" Han Chengyang, still searching for the Silverhorn Tree, caught Ye Chen's spiritual consciousness the moment it brushed against his own. The instant he realized who it belonged to, he let out a furious shout. "Damn it! So you're the one who's been taking everything that's mine?!" Without a second thought, the moment Ye Chen confirmed it was Han Chengyang, he stopped caring about the Reishi Mushrooms he had yet to finish collecting and made the decision to run. Not out of fear — but because engaging him right now would be a pointless waste of time. Aside from not knowing the true extent of the other party's strength said to be the foremost young genius of the Tianwu Sect, Ye Chen had no desire to throw away his resource-gathering time trading blows with someone like him. "Boom!" But Han Chengyang's speed was far beyond what he had anticipated. The man was already standing directly in front of him, barely ten meters away. "You little wretch! Hand over the Nine