Chapter 973: Discovered!

Several sources of aura were flying rapidly towards the direction Bai Yunfei was in. He was afraid of being detected, but Bai Yunfei could tell that this group hadn’t sensed him. They weren’t even Soul Kings but Soul Exalts. 

But even if they weren’t a threat to Bai Yunfei, he couldn’t be sure that fighting them might catch the eye of someone stronger.

“Should I teleport out of here?”

Bai Yunfei hesitated.

The original plan was for Bai Yunfei to fly out of here. This way he’d be able to take an isolated path while avoiding detection. He’d then be able to find a landmark to make note of where he was before he continued.

This was the nest of the Soul Refining School, a place where practically no one within the world of soul cultivators knew. It was considered to be ‘bad luck’ to have stumbled onto this place, but also an ‘opportunity’ to find just where the base of the enemy was.

Bai Yunfei was afraid that the people coming towards him were most likely a scouting unit from the Soul Refining School. Engaging with this unit would most definitely cause more people to come after him like a swarm of locusts. 

He didn’t mind killing any soul refiner, but Bai Yunfei wasn’t so confident in his own strength that he figured he could take on the entire school on his way out.

“Forget it…it’s too risky. My safety is the most important thing…”

After a period of hesitation, Bai Yunfei finally decided to teleport away from here.

Gathering his thoughts to him, Bai Yunfei began to prepare to use the Core Stone to teleport. But a second later, Bai Yunfei stared at the Core Stone in surprise.

The effect had failed to activate.

He was at a loss.

“Xiao Fang, what’s wrong? Why can’t you teleport us?!”

He asked Xiao Fang with a bit of panic in his voice.

“What?” Xiao Fang’s voice spoke into Bai Yunfei’s mind in confusion. “I…this isn’t good! The elemental energy in this area has gotten strange! It’s faint, but it’s enough to make teleportation impossible!”

“What?!” Bai Yunfei gasped, “They can do something like that?! How large is the area then?”

“For as far as I can teleport you from. But…if I’m not wrong, then this most likely because of a large-scale array that’s specialized to prohibit teleportation.”

There was an array that could limit the Core Stone’s teleportation effect?!

The look on Bai Yunfei’s face hardened. He never thought there’d be something like that in place.

“Then it looks like I don’t have any choice…”

He looked back towards the incoming auras and sighed.

The only thing Bai Yunfei could do right now was try and sneak away from the school without anyone noticing. He wasn’t quite sure how this would work, but he had to give it a try.

Flying away from the surface of the lake, Bai Yunfei headed for the direction opposite of the incoming unit to touch down onto the ground and run into the nearby forest.

Moving swiftly and nimbly like a monkey, Bai Yunfei traversed through the forest faster than his mirror image could be seen. Not only was he moving quickly, but he was also moving without leaving behind a single decibel of noise. Not even a tree leaf would be affected by his movements.

But when Bai Yunfei was just about a kilometer away from his starting position, he heard a small voice go off in his head!

“Oh no!!”

“Oh no?” Bai Yunfei froze still before noticing what Xiao Fang was talking about. Several auras were flying rapidly towards the area he was in!

“I was caught?! But how!” Bai Yunfei was astounded.

Xiao Fang’s voice spoke again in Bai Yunfei’s mind then. “You went through a spatial barrier just now! It won’t stop anyone from going across it or even teleport the person, but what it does is act as an ‘alarm’! The enemy will notice it if you trip it! I didn’t even notice it with how faint it was!”

“Damn! They had something like that?!” Bai Yunfei cursed. This was yet another development Bai Yunfei didn’t expect to see. He had been discovered!

“There’s no helping it now. I’ll have to fight off the enemies here!”

He declared to himself before shooting off into the opposite direction!

    ……

Five students from the Soul Refining School were currently skywalking just a few hundred meters away from Bai Yunfei at the current moment. They were all Soul Exalts. The one in front was a Late-stage Soul Exalt with the other four being split evenly between Early-stage Soul Exalts or Mid-stage Soul Exalts.

A compass could be seen in the hands of the leader. A small needle was circling within a small black ring and would sometimes change directions whenever the group moved.

Suddenly, the needle began to sparkle a bit before pointing off towards the right of where they were!

“Someone tripped the barrier! It might be the enemy, be careful everyone!”

He cried out to the other four students with him before altering course towards the right.

Everyone else grew nervous at once. One student was quick to call out to their leader. “Senior Zhang, master told us we shouldn’t get near the enemy. We’re supposed to return at once if we find a trace. Our enemy is a person who crushed Coiling Serpent Mountain and kidnapped master Lu, we should…”

But the leader sneered. “Hmph! Is there a need to be afraid?! It’s probably a wandering soulbeast that tripped the barrier, we need to make sure if its the enemy or not before we make our report. What would the elders do if we submit a wrong report?! I’m not telling you to fight the person! If there is one, then we’ll retreat at once! We’ve them surrounded, and I doubt they’ll want to waste any time-fighting. They’ll probably try to flee from us…”

 “Hmph! Is there really a reason why you’re so scared?! It’s possible that a random soulbeast tripped the barrier! We need to see if its the enemy first before we make the report, or do you want to be the one to give the elders a false report!? I’m not telling you guys to fight the person, I’m just saying we should check! If it is him, then we run away! He’s surrounded, so I doubt he’d want to fight us. He’ll probably run away with his tail tuck betwe—”

His words trailed off as he noticed the strange expression on one of his companion’s face, who looked as if they had seen a ghost. A scream from another companion caused his heart to skip a beat straight after!

“Watch out, senior Zhang!”

“It’s him!”

“Run away!”

An omen of death came blanketing over his person as he whirled around. Something in front of him was coming at him with its entire body flaring with energy like a demonic dog!

“Whoosh!!”

A beam of violet light came flying out from the forest before one of his companions was even done screaming to go straight through him!

“Ah!!”

The man cried. The man named Zhang had barely avoided a mortal wound, but the violet beam of light had still struck him through his left shoulder. The Early-stage Soul Exalt behind him wasn’t so lucky and was struck clean through the chest!

“Ah! Ah! Ah!!”

No one had time to even react until after they were hit. All they saw was a violet snake-like object come tearing at them before it streaked across three of their throats!

Blood started to spill from the four dead Soul Exalts as their bodies started to hurtle towards the ground.

“Ah!!!” The one named Zhang was aghast at the sudden death of his four companions. Before anything else, he clenched his right hand so that the small object in it was crushed!

“Pcht!” The violet streak of light came flying back towards him. Breaking apart the black barrier around his person, the beam of light then sliced across his throat!

“Hrkk…” He opened his mouth to speak, but no words were forming on his lips. Struggling as hard as he might, the man tried one last attempt to say something before he too, began to fall towards the ground. Even in his death he couldn’t believe that the enemy would be able to be this strong. It hadn’t even been five seconds for the five of them to die, and no one even saw the person’s face to begin with… 

Bai Yunfei flew up from the forest to grab hold of the Heaven’s Thunder. With the sword back in his hand, he watched as the five corpses fell out of sight down into the forest.

He had a hard look on his face following the death of those five soul refiners. He remembered seeing the last person seemingly crush something in his hand before he did; it definitely had to be some kind of messaging item. Or in other words, his enemies probably knew where he was now… 

“Damn!”

He cursed to himself before flying for the right!