Chapter 1203: Battle Between Great Encompassment Cultivators

The sword struck Qu Lin on the shoulder, drawing blood and forcing him down to one knee.

He gave a muffled groan, but he was able to stand up under the weight of the giant sword, and the wound on his shoulder was already beginning to heal.

The wielder of the sword was a short, black-robed man, and he gave a cold harrumph upon seeing this, then forced his sword with even greater force.

Qu Lin shuddered under the weight of his sword, but managed to remain on his feet on this occasion.

"Is that all you've got?" he sneered.

"I've always heard that Gold Devouring Immortals possess indestructible bodies, but it seems like you're nothing special," Chi Meng jeered as she swept a sleeve through the air, and a large swathe of fire ants quickly crawled onto Qu Lin's body, leaving behind charred black trails on his skin.

A burst of strange, golden ripples erupted out of Qu Lin's body to shake off all of the fire ants, and the giant sword on his shoulder also shuddered violently before being sent flying back.

Immediately thereafter, he stomped a foot down onto the ground, launching himself up into the air like a speeding arrow with the intention of fleeing the encirclement.

However, as he did so, the sky above suddenly darkened, and a massive ghost formed by black mist emerged from the clouds overhead to swallow him whole.

As soon as he entered the ghost's mouth, Qu Lin was immediately struck by a rush of dizziness, and before he had a chance to react, a series of semi-transparent, gray chains converged from all directions before passing directly through his body.

The gray mist swirling around the chains surged into his body, striking him with a bone-chilling sensation, and it was as if all of his immortal spiritual power had been frozen solid.

The attacks from the other black-robed figures fell upon him immediately thereafter, and even though he was caught off guard by this turn of events, he was able to withstand the barrage of attacks just fine.

"His body really is as powerful as the rumors suggest, but once I've destroyed his spiritual sense, he'll be reduced to a mindless husk that's completely at our mercy!" the tall black-robed man said, then pulled out a black flute that he brought to his lips.

A sense of foreboding immediately welled up in Han Li's heart upon seeing this.

In the next instant, the tall man blew into the flute, and all of the runes on it lit up as a burst of peculiar soundwaves proliferated through the air in all directions.

Qu Lin's calm expression instantly became distorted with pain as soon as the soundwaves reached him.

He felt as if an invisible saw had suddenly appeared in his consciousness, and it was rapidly swinging back and forth, attempting to slice his soul and consciousness into two.

Qu Lin regarded his own soul to be above average in power even among Great Encompassment cultivators, yet it was made to appear extremely fragile in the face of the flute's power.

The sound produced by the flute was gradually becoming higher and higher in pitch at the tall man's behest, and the saw transformed into countless sharp spikes that began drilling into Qu Lin's soul, causing him to let loose an involuntary howl of agony.

Even though Han Li was already mentally prepared, the three of them were also affected by the sound of the flute.

As a cultivator of similar law powers to the tall man, Weeping Soul was the least susceptible of the three, while Han Li was also able to ward off the flute's debilitating effects decently well thanks to his tremendous spiritual sense.

However, Xiaobai had only inherited the power of the Ink-Eyed Pixiu for a short time, and even though he was forcing himself not to make any sounds, the trembling of his body clearly indicated his discomfort.

A concerned look appeared on Weeping Soul's face upon seeing this, and a vertical eye surfaced on her glabella, following which two beams of red light emerged from within before shooting into Han Li and Xiaobai's glabellas to lessen their discomfort.

Right at this moment, Chi Meng's voice suddenly rang out.

"If I had known that you would serve yourself up to me on a silver platter, then I wouldn't have gone to so much trouble to look for you, Han Li."

In the blink of an eye, she was already hovering above their heads.

Seeing as their cover had already been blown, Han Li emerged from hiding with Xiaobai and Weeping Soul, and the three of them rose up into the air.

Weeping Soul had already released a dark red spirit domain to encompass all three of them, and a composed smile appeared on Han Li's face as he mused, "Sorry to have kept you waiting, Celestial Maiden Chi Meng."

"Fellow Daoist Han!" Lan Yan exclaimed upon catching sight of Han Li from afar.

Chi Meng took a moment to examine Han Li, and a hint of surprise appeared in her eyes upon detecting his aura.

Not much time had passed since their previous encounter, yet he had already managed to reach the Great Encompassment Stage during this time.

However, she then quickly regained her composure as she scoffed, "So what if you've reached the Great Encompassment Stage? You're still nothing more than a newborn chick that hasn't even severed a single corpse soul. I'm not letting you get away again!"

After reaching the early-Great Encompassment Stage, one could make further breakthroughs with each corpse soul that was severed, and upon severing all three corpse souls, one would become a Dao Ancestor.

Each corpse soul severance was an extremely perilous process, but a successful severance would grant one a significant boost in power unlike any previous breakthrough made below the Great Encompassment Stage.

With so many powerful allies on her side, Chi Meng was naturally fully confident in her ability to take down Han Li. The only thing that she had to be wary of was that strange secret technique that he had used to escape from her last time.

With that in mind, she swept a sleeve through the air to conjure up a massive, spherical light barrier, which rapidly expanded to encompass the entire surrounding area in a radius of several hundred kilometers.

The surrounding air instantly became scorching hot, and eight fiery waterfalls came crashing down from the heavens, reducing the ground in Chi Meng's spirit domain to a lake of molten lava.

All of the bodies of water within the spirit domain quickly evaporated away, while the earth became so parched that countless massive trenches and cracks had appeared all over its surface.

Xiaobai immediately felt his own mouth run dry, and it was as if all of the surrounding world's origin qi had been incinerated by the scorching heat in the spirit domain.

"She seems like quite a pain to deal with," Xiaobai remarked.

"Looks like she wasn't using her full power at all during our last encounter," Han Li said as his brows furrowed slightly.

"Elder Xi Tang, I'll leave that Gold Devouring Immortal to you and Elder Jian Qiu. Everyone else, help me capture this man," Chi Meng ordered

The tall man with the Soul Scattering Ghost Flute and the wielder of the golden sword both gave an affirmative response, while the other two black-robed figures flew over to Chi Meng's side.

"Weeping Soul, go and help Qu Lin," Han Li instructed, and Weeping Soul nodded in response before turning to depart.

"You think you can just come and go as you please in my spirit domain?" Chi Meng snapped in a furious manner, and a fiery giant that was over a thousand feet tall slowly emerged from the lake of bubbling lava down below, wielding a massive, fiery sword as it stood in Weeping Soul's path.

Weeping Soul gave a cold harrumph upon seeing this, and she summoned her newly acquired Infernal Ghost Claw before sweeping it through the air, unleashing several black claw projections that tore the fiery giant to pieces.

A pleased look appeared on her face as she looked down at the Infernal Ghost Claw, while the dismembered fiery giant disintegrated back into molten lava that flowed into the lake.

"There's more where that came from!" Chi Meng scoffed as one fiery giant after another rose up from the lava lake at her behest, storming at Han Li's trio while swinging their massive swords through the air.

Han Li swept a sleeve through the air to conjure up his golden spirit domain, which overlapped with Chi Meng's fiery spirit domain, and the fiery giants were instantly slowed down to a crawl, allowing Weeping Soul to dismember them with ease before continuing onward to fly to Qu Lin's aid.

However, right at this moment, a molten wyrm suddenly flew out of one of the lava waterfalls, and it opened its cavernous mouth before biting down at Weeping Soul's head, only to also be dismembered by her Infernal Ghost Claw without being able to pose any resistance.

However, instead of disintegrating like the fiery giants, the dismembered pieces of the lava wyrm's body instantly fused back together amid a flash of crimson light, and it continued to bite down upon Weeping Soul.

Right at this moment, Han Li's voice rang out beside her ears.

"Don't worry about that thing, just keep going."

Weeping Soul did as she was told, paying no further heed to her fiery assailant as she charged directly onward.

Right as she was about to be devoured by the molten wyrm, the sound of flowing water suddenly rang out as a golden river rose up from the ground before flowing straight into the wyrm's mouth.

The wyrm was instantly stopped cold in its tracks as plumes of white mist rose up from its body, and Weeping Soul was able to ride the wave straight through its body to arrive by Qu Lin's side.

A look of mixed emotions flashed through Qu Lin's eyes at the sight of Han Li.

Meanwhile, Elder Xi Tang began playing his flute again, but on this occasion, all of the soundwaves that it released were condensed into a compact stream that solely targeted Weeping Soul instead of spreading in all directions.

A faint smile appeared on Weeping Soul's face, and not only was she not fearful in the slightest, she was wondering to herself how much her powers would be enhanced from devouring the tall man.

For some reason, a chill ran down Elder Xi Tang's spine at the sight of Weeping Soul's excited grin.