Yang Xing sensed the rapid loss of spiritual energy in the cave. When the spiritual energy loss reached a certain level, the concentration of spiritual energy in the cave dropped to an extremely dangerous critical point.

Although he had never encountered the decline of the spiritual energy in the cave, he understood what would happen when the spiritual energy in the cave declined to a certain level.

He quickly took out a meridian-locking plate, which contained a spiritual vein of a peak great monk level.

This was the spiritual vein of his original cave, which he had collected as a backup. Now it has become the hope of saving the cave.

But this only solved the problem temporarily and did not solve the fundamental problem. Although the rate of decrease in the concentration of spiritual energy in the cave was alleviated, it did not stop decreasing.

Now there is an additional spiritual vein of a peak great monk to provide spiritual energy, it will only delay the period for a while.

Time passed little by little, and Li Shiming outside discovered that the amount of spiritual energy extracted suddenly increased. There was nothing strange about it. As a half-step great man, he must have a lot of good things in his hands. As the spiritual energy decreased, he naturally needed to use some means to save it.

He believed that no matter what means the Half-Step Great Power used, it would not be as fast as the speed at which the formation he had carefully arranged could extract spiritual energy.

In the cave, Yang Xing helplessly sensed the loss of spiritual energy. He did everything he could.

Finally, the moment the concentration of spiritual energy in the cave dropped below the critical point, the thunderclouds above the cave began to fade, and there were signs of disappearing.

"No!" Yang Xing screamed in panic.

You can't blame him for losing his composure. The most important thing in the cave is the rules of lightning in the thunderclouds. Without the support of the thunderclouds, the lightning will disappear.

Since his cave does not have the ability to solidify the rules, once the lightning disappears, the rules of lightning will also disappear, and his thousands of years of efforts will end in failure.

And he will collapse along with the cave, and death will come.

He tried hard to mobilize the spiritual power in his body to maintain the thunderclouds.

But no matter how much spiritual power is output, it will be absorbed by the thunderclouds and converted into spiritual energy, and then extracted by the formation outside.

"What on earth do you want to do?" he shouted.

However, his voice could not be transmitted out of the cave on its own, and Li Shiming did not probe his spiritual sense into the cave, so no matter how loud he spoke, Li Shiming would not be able to hear him.

Even if he wanted to beg for mercy and asked Li Shiming to let him go, he couldn't contact Li Shiming.

Li Shiming didn't care about the situation inside the cave. He only needed to focus on the spiritual energy extracted by the formation to know the general situation inside the cave.

At this time, the concentration of the extracted spiritual energy was already very low. He knew that his plan had succeeded and he had found a way to deal with the half-step great power.

Without the support of spiritual energy, he had no idea what the consequences would be, but he knew one thing, that is, both the half-step great power himself and the cave heaven needed to consume a certain amount of spiritual energy.

Although the cave can absorb spiritual energy from the void and maintain the basic consumption of the cave, there is still a certain surplus.

But with formations in the outside world extracting spiritual energy, which only goes out but not in, the spiritual energy will only become less and less, until it can no longer maintain the basic consumption of the cave, and then the cave will be in big trouble.

Li Shiming had no choice but to resort to this last resort.

He was almost killed by a half-step great power, so he naturally didn't want to let this half-step great power go.

The most important thing is that he cannot let this half-step great power live. If this half-step great power is promoted to a great power, he will have a hard time in the future.

The Half-Step Great Power had a mortal enemy with him. After the Half-Step Great Power was promoted to the Great Power, I'm afraid the first thing he would do would be to hunt him down.

He had no confidence that he could escape from the pursuit of a powerful person. He had seen how Old Jian performed, and the finger pointed at him by the half-step powerful person before made him realize the gap between himself and the powerful person.

Li Shiming cast several spells in succession, and the array's ability to draw spiritual energy increased further.

Gradually, the spiritual energy drawn by the formation dropped to a level that was even lower than that of the outside world, and it was still decreasing.

This is just an ordinary area without any spiritual veins. No cultivators will settle here, mainly because there is too little spiritual energy.

It can be seen that the spiritual energy in the cave has reached such a level now that it is no longer sufficient to support the consumption of the cave. The cave is currently in a state of severe consumption and lack of spiritual energy.

Inside the cave, Yang Xing continued to use his own spiritual power to maintain the existence of the thunderclouds. He also understood that this was a temporary solution. Once too much spiritual power was consumed in his body, he himself would not be able to survive.

But at this moment, he was bound to the cave heaven, he was one with the cave heaven. The half-step to great power was a special period, he needed to be with the cave heaven all the time, as long as the cave heaven was with him, he would die, and if the cave heaven died, he would die too.

So even though he knew it was a waste of effort, he was still using his spiritual power to support the most critical lightning rules in the cave.

Currently in the cave, except for the rules of thunder and lightning which were supported by his spiritual power, the other rules could no longer be maintained because the spiritual energy was too thin.

The disappearance of each rule made him feel heartbroken. It took him at least a hundred years to comprehend each rule here and make it manifest in the cave.

These fruits of his hard work, however, dissipated in a short time. Even if he managed to overcome the trouble this time, his hope of becoming a powerful person would become extremely slim.

"I will become a Mahayana cultivator. I am the most talented cultivator in Yuqing Sect in the past three thousand years!" he shouted madly.

Emotions such as fear, dread, worry, unwillingness, and anger eventually turned into hysterical madness.

He yelled, wanting to vent his anger, but he had no one to vent it to, and he had no place to vent his anger.

"I am the Almighty, I am the Almighty!" His eyes gradually turned red and he muttered the same words.

Maintaining the existence of thunderclouds became his obsession. Apart from the obsession, his Taoism heart was lost.

Why must a half-step great power go into seclusion? Apart from the fact that he cannot go out during the process of merging himself with the cave heaven, another reason is that a half-step great power in this state is in the initial stage of merging himself with the cave heaven, which makes his mind and character most vulnerable to being affected.

Meditation alone, staying in one's own cave and not contacting the outside world is the best way to solve the problem of being affected by one's mind and nature. It is also the experience summed up by monks over countless years.

When Yang Xing was facing life and death, his Taoist faith finally collapsed, and he entered a state of being possessed by demons.

When it comes to the invasion of inner demons, the higher the level, the more dangerous it is.

His mind was affected by the inner demon, and the Nascent Soul in his body changed from pure white to black, and his consciousness was replaced by the inner demon at this time.

The black Nascent Soul flew out of the body and plunged into the thundercloud.

Although the inner demon erupted, the only obsession still affected the inner demon's behavior, and the inner demon still maintained the thundercloud.

However, under the influence of the inner demon, the existence of thunderclouds has come to rely on the power of the inner demon rather than spiritual energy.

Li Shiming didn't know what happened in the cave. He found that the spiritual energy he extracted had become extremely thin.

"No, the spiritual energy is decreasing too fast!" he said with a frown.

Before, there was a half-step great being who actively mobilized his spiritual power to support the thundercloud. The amount of spiritual power in the body of a half-step great being was as vast as the ocean. Even if it was just to maintain the state of thundercloud, it could delay it for several months.

Li Shiming had considered spending a long time to slowly extract the spiritual energy. Anyway, once everything here was normal, he could just leave a late-stage golden corpse to watch over it and then leave to do his own thing.

But he never expected that the process of extracting spiritual energy would be so fast. After only a short time, the spiritual energy in the cave was drained away.

In fact, he underestimated the size of Yang Xing, a half-step great master, and did not calculate what Yang Xing was facing.

Because of his behavior, Yang Xing fell into an inner demon. Moreover, since there was no destructible target in the cave, even if the inner demon was generated, it had no way to vent. As a result, the inner demon replaced Yang Xing and continued to maintain the existence of the thundercloud with another kind of energy.

After several more hours, Li Shiming confirmed through the extracted spiritual energy that the spiritual energy in the cave was indeed almost non-existent.

He was somewhat curious about the current state of the Half-Step Great Power. It was very simple to check the state of the Half-Step Great Power. He only needed to send a trace of spiritual consciousness into the cave to know what happened.

For a normal great monk, doing this is extremely dangerous.

Divine consciousness is a component of the great monk's spirit. If it is attacked and injured, it is equivalent to mental trauma.

However, Li Shiming has one hundred and ninety-one brains, so he does not need to use the main brain. At the same time, he also has elixirs to heal the mental damage of the great monk. Even if one brain is damaged, it will only allow the brain to rest for a period of time and cannot be used.

His curiosity grew stronger and stronger, and he could no longer hold back. He used his brain to extend a spiritual consciousness and probe into the cave.

"Ah!" As soon as the spiritual consciousness entered the cave, it was greeted by a black fog, and the spiritual consciousness was corroded by the black fog.

In other words, he was able to retract his spiritual consciousness quickly enough, so that not too much of it was lost.

But the mental pain coming from that brain made him scream out.

"What's going on?" Li Shiming recalled what he had detected with his spiritual sense, his face full of questions.

If this half-step great master came from the Demon Sect, the scene in the cave could be explained.

But he is a half-step great master of Yuqing Sect. How could the cave be like a devil's cave?

"No, it's the inner demon!" He quickly denied his previous judgment and thought about what he felt just now.

This was not the first time he encountered his inner demon. The Venerable Hui Jing, whom he had not summoned for a long time, was controlled by him because he encountered his inner demon.

He immediately determined that the Half-Step Great Power had encountered some trouble. It seemed that his act of extracting spiritual energy had caused the Half-Step Great Power to go astray.

He smiled, finally getting his revenge.

It is really surprising that a half-step great power could lose control of himself in this way.

Li Shiming thought of his inner demon. He was the cultivator who was least worried about or afraid of his inner demon.

Because he has a special spiritual pet, the Heavenly Ghost, which is the nemesis of the inner demon, and this was manifested a long time ago.

He summoned the celestial ghost that existed in the body of Master Luo Pei. He was still a little hesitant before giving the celestial ghost an order.

Let the Heavenly Ghost enter the cave and eliminate the inner demon. If it is really an inner demon, the Heavenly Ghost will be extremely low in danger.

But if the Half-Step Great Power had intentionally set a trap, then the Heavenly Ghost would be in danger.

Li Shiming recalled the black fog he encountered when his spiritual consciousness entered the cave just now, as well as the feeling of erosion on his spirit, and he once again confirmed his judgment.

He sent the Heavenly Ghost into the cave, and left one of his brains inside the body of the Heavenly Ghost to prevent any accidents and to facilitate the command of the Heavenly Ghost to respond.

When the celestial ghost entered the cave, he encountered a vast expanse of black fog.

According to the Heavenly Ghost's perception, this is the black fog produced by the inner demon, which is composed entirely of negative emotions.

The sky ghost flew into the black fog, but the black fog didn't seem to notice it.

This is normal, as the outer shell of the Sky Ghost is the skin of the Sky Demon. The Sky Demon is the most special and highest-level spiritual creature among all the spiritual creatures.

Li Shiming shared the perception of the Heavenly Ghost through the contract connection with the Heavenly Ghost.

He discovered that the Heavenly Ghost had an instinctive sense for the inner demon, so when he entered the cave, even though there was isolation from the black fog, he was able to immediately find the location of the inner demon.

The celestial ghost, who was about to pounce, was ordered to stop by Li Shiming.

The Heavenly Ghost only sensed the inner demon but did not pay attention to other things.

But Li Shiming clearly sensed the existence of thunder and lightning rules ahead, and according to the perception he shared from the Heavenly Ghost, there was only this one thunder and lightning rule in the entire cave, and no other rules existed.

Using one rule to support the entire cave is probably the first step in the creation of the cave.

He didn't know that there were still many rules in the beginning, but unfortunately he extracted too much spiritual energy and those rules could not be maintained.

Li Shiming thought of another thing at this moment. It was recorded in some classics that the cave heaven of a half-step great power would collapse after the death of the half-step great power.

He could no longer sense the life breath of the Half-Step Great Power. The only thing that existed was the inner demon. Why did this cave still exist?

In addition, if the rules of thunder and lightning also disappeared, would this cave still exist?

A strange scene appeared in the cave. It was probably the first time such a thing happened in the world of immortal cultivation.

Yang Xing, a half-step great power, was extremely unlucky. He was sent out by the sect to carry out a mission when he was in the critical period of retreat.

He met Li Shiming who blocked the connection between the cave and the outside world, and used formations to extract the spiritual energy inside, which finally forced Yang Xing to go insane.

When he was possessed by the devil and developed a mental demon, Yang Xing's last obsession was to maintain the existence of thunderclouds, that is, to ensure the existence of the rules of thunder and lightning.

When the inner demon is formed, if it fails to destroy its target, it will be affected by the obsession and maintain the existence of the thundercloud in its own way.

Since the inner demon is a spiritual being, it uses spiritual energy to maintain thunderclouds. Obsession also plays a role here, or perhaps for some unknown reason, the rules of thunder and lightning are indeed stabilized by the inner demon.

During this period, Yang Xing, the half-step great power, had actually fallen, and was replaced by his inner demon.

The cave heaven that should have been destroyed along with Yang Xing was miraculously preserved due to the support of the same inner demon, and did not perish with him.