Chapter 166: Fifth Rank!

His sword formation was finally deployed. It was like a tiny world filled with sword qi, and that seemed to be the essence of his Yin Yang Sword Formation!

It was Shang Xia’s third time using the Yin Yang Sword Formation. Every time he used it, he would gain a deeper understanding of his martial intent. In his desperation, he gained an extremely important insight.

One sword, one world! That was the key to his Yin Yang Sword Formation!

The only problem was that his martial intent sucked up too much inner qi!

It hadn’t been long since he comprehended his martial intent in the stone chamber. Since he hadn’t taken a break to recover after releasing his martial intent thrice, the amount of Yin Yang Essence Qi left in his dantian was sparse! At best, he had 30 percent of inner qi left!

Even with his deep reserves, he estimated that he would only be able to use the Yin Yang Sword Formation four times when he was at his peak state before exhausting himself!

If anyone else were to train in the Yin Yang Sword Formation, things would get awkward when they realized that they couldn’t last more than twice!

Was there a need to mention that the Yin Yang Sword Formation could still advance? Once Shang Xia comprehended how to increase the types of qi in the sword formation, the amount of inner qi needed to sustain the technique would be incredibly high! Moreover, if he used the full strength of the formation every time, there would be a lot of energy wasted if the sword qi dissipated without striking the opponent.

As such, Shang Xia decided that he had to control his martial intent to the greatest degree possible. He would ensure that no energy was wasted, and he could greatly reduce the strain on his meridians.

What was done was done. Shang Xia felt a dull aching in his heart when he noticed the undead corpses around him getting torn to shreds. The power contained in his Yin Yang Sword Formation was so tyrannical that it destroyed everything! Even if the undead corpses had anything valuable on them, everything would have been turned to dust.

Of course, it was more likely that Zhu Ying had already taken everything of value from their bodies. Not only did the guy possess a Vermillion Plaque, but he could also even control the undead corpses!

If not for the annoying bastard, Shang Xia wouldn’t have been attacked!

Sucking in a cold breath, Shang Xia circulated his inner qi once again. He needed to replenish all the energy he could in case anything else happened. His pale face started to regain some color.

Staring at the shards that had fallen to the ground, Shang Xia sighed. He wasted a perfectly good weapon yet again.

Even though the sword wasn’t a graded weapon, it was still made from valuable materials! It was worth quite a bit!

Whatever the case, he couldn’t be bothered with a mere weapon at the moment. His gaze landed on the pavilion where Zhu Ying disappeared.

What secrets did it hold?

When Shang Xia was thinking of whether he should enter, the pillars holding the pavilion exploded as a black shadow soared into the skies. It moved so quickly that Shang Xia could only see a blur.

Even though he couldn’t see its facial features, Shang Xia felt a chill running down his spine. From what Mu Qingyu said earlier, a black shadow appeared and tore Liu Jitang and the other expert beside him to shreds. The black figure…

When Shang Xia felt that his life was about to come to an end, he saw the black figure tearing a hole through space. He could see several surprised expressions on the other side of the hole, and that included Ji Wenlong’s shocked face!

By the time the spatial hole closed, the black figure was nowhere to be seen.

Shang Xia couldn’t believe he just escaped death, but before he could heave a sigh of relief, he saw another stone wall standing tall in the pavilion that exploded earlier.

There was a bronze gate that was slightly open sitting in the middle of the wall, and a gloomy chamber sat behind it.

Intricate runes filled the ground inside the gate, and there was a tiny mountain that hovered in mid air.

Shang Xia noticed Zhu Ying standing beside the tiny mountain as he reached towards it carefully.

Zhu Ying clearly didn’t expect Shang Xia to escape the assault of the undead corpses so quickly. He was so shocked that he forgot what he was doing in the first place.

With his mouth wide open, he stared at Shang Xia in shock. He controlled so many undead corpses to attack the man! There were even four of them at the third rank! Even a Martial Intent Realm expert would have been torn to shreds by the combined might of the undead corpses, much less Shang Xia who was only at the Martial Extremity Realm!

However, reality proved him wrong… The undead corpses were nowhere to be seen!

Zhu Ying withdrew his hand and his eyelids twitched violently. He muttered to himself, “Damn it. I shouldn’t have trusted the undead corpse-controlling technique… How can it fail at the last second?!”

He obviously didn’t believe that Shang Xia was able to deal with so many undead corpses without suffering many injuries. He would rather believe that the undead corpses left his control. If a few of them ran off by themselves, he felt that Shang Xia still had the ability to deal with the stragglers that were left.

After all, Shang Xia also had a Vermillion Plaque. His cultivation was profound, and from what Zhu Ying saw previously in the stone chamber, Shang Xia also had the method to make undead corpses avoid him.

Everything could be blamed on the fact that Shang Xia’s Yin Yang Sword Formation was too damn powerful. It destroyed everything in his path, and not a speck of those undead corpses was left. No one could blame Zhu Ying for thinking that way.

“I thought that my Zhu Family and the Tongyou Institution were the only ones who possessed the unique way to control the Vermillion Plaque. Who would have thought that your Shang Clan had also been scheming against us… They even taught you how to use light and heavy qi!” Zhu Ying revealed a sinister smile. His brain had already started to malfunction since god knew how long ago, and he started to walk towards Shang Xia slowly.

Shang Xia’s expression sank. Even though Zhu Ying had been beaten up badly in the stone chamber, he looked extremely confident now. He seemed to have gotten some sort of trump card that could allow him to defeat Shang Xia.

“Are you not afraid that I’ll kill you?” Shang Xia asked.

Pausing for a second, a snort escaped Zhu Ying’s lips. “You can try…”

Even though he had spoken so confidently, he stopped moving entirely. He didn’t dare to close in on Shang Xia any longer.

No longer looking at Zhu Ying, Shang Xia’s gaze turned to the tiny mountain hovering in mid air before asking casually, “What’s that?”

A trace of anger flashed in Zhu Ying’s eyes, and he snapped in irritation, “Why should I tell you?!”

Shang Xia seemed to have expected the answer already. He followed up with several questions, “Did you release the black figure earlier?”

“Hahaha, are you afraid now?! Do you know who that was?” Zhu Ying sneered. He stared at Shang Xia like he was staring at a dead man.

However, Shang Xia couldn’t be bothered with him. Instead, he asked even more questions of his own. “How can you consider yourself a disciple of the Tongyou Institution?”

A flustered expression appeared on Zhu Ying’s face for a moment, but he quickly suppressed his feelings. “Why should I care about the Tongyou Institution?! It only accepted me and treated me as a disciple because they wanted to use me to obtain the Zhu Family’s inheritance! I…”

Before he could finish, Shang Xia asked yet another question. “What’s behind those gates?”

“Shang… Xia…” Zhu Ying spat his name out word by word and snapped, “You’re going too far!”

Shang Xia didn’t even have to do anything as Zhu Ying pointed at him and started running his mouth. “Do you even know who left earlier?! It’s the patriarch of my Zhu Family, Zhu Tong! All of you… All of you will die here today!”

Shang Xia sneered in contempt. “Isn’t it just an undead corpse?”

“You don’t understand anything! The old patriarch managed to break through to the fifth level… The Martial Dipper Realm! Do you even know what that means?!” Zhu Ying roared.

“A rank five undead corpse?” Shang Xia raised a single eyebrow. Even though he looked calm on the surface, waves were crashing against his fragile heart.

That was a true rank five undead corpse! His worst fears came true!

It was an extremely terrifying existence! If it managed to escape from the Coral Forest, it would be able to sweep through the battlefield between two worlds unhindered!

No… I have to stop it. At the very least, I need to inform the members of the institution! We have to avoid the rank five undead corpse at all cost!

Even though Shang Xia was burning with anxiety, he forced himself to maintain his calm expression.

He was trying to buy enough time to recover some inner qi. After all, he exhausted a huge portion of it several moments ago!

“Hehehe…” Zhu Ying, who looked a little out of it, cackled violently. “I know… You… You're afraid! Hahaha! You’re trying to provoke me in order to look for my weakness! You’re afraid that I’ll be able to control Zhu Tong with my technique to control undead corpses. You think you’ll be able to deal with the rank five undead corpse as long as you deal with me! Hahaha! You’re probably gathering energy in order to deal with me! Hahaha… You’re too naive!”

Shang Xia sneered in his heart, but a frown formed on his face as he responded to Zhu Ying. “You… How did you know?! If you can’t control the rank five undead corpse, it would have already torn you to shreds the moment it emerged! How… How are you still alive?”

“Hah… You’re truly hopeless. How can you be so ignorant?” Zhu Ying snorted.

Shang Xia’s expression sank and he growled, “Ignorant or not… Wouldn’t I learn everything once I kill you?”

Zhu Ying couldn’t help but roar with laughter after hearing what he said. A mocking smile appeared on his face. “Do you really think you can kill me?” After speaking, a terrifying wave of energy emerged from his body. His divine sense became a formless pressure that pressed down on Shang Xia’s shoulders!

He managed to enter the Martial Intent Realm!