Chapter 87: First Exploration of Mount Hanji

The whole valley was filled with poisonous snakes with black skin and red eyes. On their triangular heads, one could vaguely see their bright red tongues extending and retracting. Their two green bean-sized eyes revealed a fierce light as they stared at the two people standing at the entrance of the valley.

Judging from the visual, there are at least tens of thousands of black snakes here. The black snakes hissed and spit out their fiery red tongues. They slowly crawled towards Gong Yang Zhongyu and Ji Zichen in a winding manner, and slowly surrounded them.

Then, the cultivators following behind also came to the valley. When they saw thousands of snakes swarming around in the valley, they stopped and did not dare to act rashly.

"Aren't they just a few small snakes? Is there any need to be so scared?" A cultivator with a sharp forehead, dark skin, and a full beard looked at everyone with a sneer and rushed forward alone. Halfway through, his body flashed with green light, and the shadow of a giant python emerged from his body and finally overlapped with his body. After the cultivator's body overlapped with the snake shadow, it was no different from the python.

Everyone suddenly realized that the plan was to pass through in a snake-like shape!

Some people are envious, while others are unwilling.

"If I had known this would happen, I would have caught a spirit snake when I was hunting spirit beasts!" someone sighed.

However, something dangerous happened. Before the snake cultivator had even walked halfway, he was suddenly entangled by a black snake that emerged from the ground like a ghost. Then it opened its bloody mouth and bit his body. The sharp teeth of the black snake instantly sprayed venom into the cultivator's body the moment it pierced his body. The cultivator, who was still struggling, slowly stopped, twitching, his two cheekbones protruding, his eyes rolled up blankly, without a trace of light, his whole face was like a piece of yellow paper, without a single blood color, and he let the black snake wander around and entangle on his body.

“Dead…dead…” Everyone gasped.

Just now some people envied him and wanted to imitate him, but now they are glad that they did not do anything stupid!

Ji Zichen frowned slightly, "What do you think?"

Gong Yang Zhongyu glanced at the cultivator's body and replied calmly, "What else can we do? Just kill him!"

Before he finished speaking, the Twelve Swords spun rapidly around him, and he had already rushed into the valley with the Tianmu Sword in his hand.

Outside the border of the Hanji Mountains, a dazzling colored glaze vase slowly descended from the sky.

Shi Yan jumped out of the glazed treasure bottle, took the glazed treasure bottle back into his body, and stepped into the realm of Hanji Mountain.

As soon as he stepped in, Shi Yan felt as if his chest was hit by a heavy hammer. He couldn't help but groan, and his heart suddenly beat violently.

"What is this feeling?" Shi Yan frowned, took a deep breath, and then slowly exhaled. Only then was the discomfort in his body relieved.

He walked quickly along the mountain path. Along the way, Shi Yan was observing the black ice crystals on the Hanji Mountain. These black ice crystals were like crystals, with sharp edges and corners, and were crystal clear. Under the sunlight, they could refract light. However, there was a wisp of black mist wandering in the ice crystals. This wisp of black mist was like countless tiny snakes entangled together, which looked creepy.

During this period, Shi Yan discovered that in the territory of Hanji Mountain, it was impossible to absorb spiritual energy from the air outside the body. So Shi Yan used the underground ground veins to explore. Although the ground energy of the outside ground veins could not enter the territory of Hanji Mountain, it was possible that Hanji Mountain had its own ground vein network and its own ground energy.

The black ice crystals were difficult to penetrate with spiritual power, so Shi Yan could only separate a wisp of spiritual consciousness and merge it into the spiritual power. Then he carefully used Yang Yan to attach it to the spiritual power, so that the spiritual power would have the effect of Yang Yan. When the spiritual power with Yang Yan came into contact with the black ice crystals, the black ice crystals seemed to have life, turning into a pool of black water flowing to both sides, and then returning to their original appearance.

As Shi Yan expected, when the spiritual power explored downwards, a series of criss-crossing veins were discovered under the black ice crystals. These were the veins of Hanji Mountain.

The distribution of the geomagnetic veins in Hanji Mountain is very complex, like a spider web, crisscrossing and overlapping, forming a huge geomagnetic network.

However, although there is earth energy in the earth veins, compared with the natural earth energy in the outside world, the earth energy here is actually sticky black. This black color is like the condensed black mist in the black ice crystals that make up the Hanji Mountain on the ground.

"Could it be!" Shi Yan stroked his tall nose and speculated, "Could it be that the black air in Hanji Mountain is some alien earth energy? It is impossible for such a large mountain-sized alien earth energy to be formed naturally. It must be that some great master has marked out this place as a mother body to nurture the earth energy."

"But, what exactly is the function of this earth energy?" Shi Yan's brows were wrinkled into a "川" shape, his eyes full of confusion and doubt.

He walked quickly while thinking hard, thinking that it would be great if Canglan was here. After all, he was a top master eight hundred years ago and naturally knew much more than ordinary cultivators. Perhaps he could know something.

"Oh, right, since Canglan is my contracted spirit beast, we can naturally communicate with each other!" Shi Yan suddenly realized, slapped his head, and cursed himself for being stupid. He quickly entered the world of mind and found Canglan's thoughts.

A feeling of mutual connection arises spontaneously, and my heart trembles constantly, as if it is pulling an invisible string. Now, if I want to find the heart on the other side of the string, I have to pluck the string.

The strings of the piano trembled slightly, and even my heart began to tremble.

"Boy, what's the matter? Don't you know I'm busy now?" A ray of blue thought came, turning into a sound and exploding directly in the brain. Shi Yan, who had no experience, was startled by the sudden sound and it took him a long time to get used to it.

"Cang Lan?" I originally just wanted to give it a try, but I didn't expect that it would actually work.

What he didn't know was that, normally, a spirit beast and its contracted beastmaster couldn't sense each other at a certain distance, let alone talk. The fact that Yan and Canglan could talk to each other when he was a child could only be attributed to the most domineering contract in the world, the forced contract.

"Bullshit, who else could it be but me?" Cang Lan said impatiently, "If you have something to say, say it now. I don't have that much free time to chat with you here. If you delay my precious time to treat Ye Yier and prevent her from waking up, I will rush over and peel off your skin right away!"

Thinking of that beautiful figure who was as beautiful as spring plum blossoms blooming in the snow and as graceful as autumn orchids covered in frost, Shi Yan couldn't help but feel worried and asked hurriedly, "How is Ye Yier? Is there anything serious?"

Canglan groaned for a while and said, "It's not a big deal, but..."

"But what?"

Canglan sighed, "I checked her, and Yi'er is fine. She is very energetic and has no problems at all."

"Then why can't she wake up?" Shi Yan clenched his hands into fists and asked nervously.

"Don't be impatient, listen to me first!" Canglan said: "I think that her inability to wake up is not a physical problem, but a spiritual problem."

"soul?"

"Yes, it is the soul! I think the reason why Yi'er has not woken up is that her soul is not in her body. When she was hit hard, her soul was knocked out of her body and wandered around in the outside world!"

"This..." Shi Yan was speechless, his lips trembling slightly, unable to speak. If the soul leaves the body and never returns, isn't that the same as being dead?

At this time, Canglan's voice was heard again, "However, if the soul does not return to the body for a long time, the vitality of the body should gradually weaken and eventually die. But why is Yi'er's vitality still strong, without any sign of decline?"

"In more than a thousand years, I have never heard of such a thing. Unless her soul did not leave her body, but was sealed somewhere in her body." Canglan sighed slightly, with a hint of sadness in his voice, "It's a pity that I have reached the ninth level of Nirvana and have to start my cultivation from the beginning. With my current ability, I can't find out where her soul is. It seems that I can only wait until I reach the great perfection of Nirvana!"

"Then when will you achieve Nirvana? This is related to a person's life and death!"

Upon hearing this, Cang Lan cursed angrily: "Do you think it is so easy to achieve Nirvana? If it were so easy, why would so many spirit beasts continue to fail on this path, eventually being defeated by time and turning into a pile of yellow earth?"

"This...I..." Shi Yan was scolded by Canglan and was so embarrassed that he was speechless.

Thinking of Shi Yan, the young man, Cang Lan felt helpless. After thinking about it, he gave up and comforted him, "Okay, don't worry, Yi'er will be fine. Her vitality is very rare. I guess your vitality is not as strong as hers, so you don't have to worry. By the way, what exactly did you come to see me for?"

Shi Yan knew that it was useless to worry about Ye Yier now, so he had to suppress his worries and explained to Canglan the problems he encountered in Hanji Mountain. After listening, Canglan pondered for a long time and asked several questions, which Shi Yan answered truthfully one by one.

Afterwards, Canglan mentioned a few places that required Shi Yan to verify. Shi Yan investigated one by one. In the end, Canglan's face became solemn and he remained silent.

"Canglan, have you thought of anything?"

Canglan hummed, his voice a little hoarse, "If it's really as you said, then I think I might know it!"

"What is it?" Shi Yan asked impatiently

Canglan looked into the distance, his dark purple eyes seemed to have lost focus. He narrowed his eyes slightly and whispered through gritted teeth, "It must be my old enemy, the culprit that caused my cultivation to not recover until now!"

Shi Yan couldn't help but take a breath, and a vague answer came to his mind...

"Toki Great Snake!"