Four days passed in a flash.

A fiery-red lava river flowed through the land of ice and snow, rumbling loudly like thunder as it rushed past.

Boom!

A giant crane spread its flaming wings in the air, sending out a spray of dreadful fire-light that tore open cracks in the surrounding space.

Its terrifying strength was comparable to Cyclic Derivation heaven prides.

However, it had unfortunately run into Lin Xun.

Plop!

Lin Xun executed the Combustion Star River dao art in a flash. A combusting starry river rapidly spread across the sky, swallowing the giant crane and killing it.

With a loud boom, its body turned into a rain of liquid fire as a glittering divinity crystal fell from the air.

Lin Xun caught the crystal and stored it in his storage ring.

Without stopping to take a break, he continued along the long lava river as his moon-white clothes fluttered amidst the snow and wind.

……

Lin Xun had been wandering around the mysterious realm of ice and snow for the past four days. Although he encountered many dangers, they were all easily resolved by him.

"I’ve collected thirty-nine divinity crystals. If I absorb them, my cultivation should reach the mid Cyclic Derivation stage."

Lin Xun pondered as he advanced.

"It’s regrettable that there seem to be no other places where divinity herbs can be found other than the Fire Lotus Ice Mountain..."

Lin Xun had also been searching for divinity herbs, but had found nothing so far.

He had originally wanted to return to the Fire Lotus Ice Mountain, but a strange change had occurred the day before yesterday that caused the Fire Lotus Ice Mountain to vanish.

According to the experts he had met along the way, a second nine-petal fire lotus had not appeared after Lin Xun collected the first one and left.

It made Lin Xun realize that there was probably a fixed number of these scarce opportunities, and not just anyone could obtain them.

Omm~

In the distance, the piercing sounds of spatial fluctuations drew Lin Xun’s attention.

𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

He approached just in time to see four young men and women cry out in anger before they were teleported away.

They had obviously been eliminated.

The culprit was a group of bats made of ice and snow. Each was the size of a millstone, had scarlet pupils, snow-white fangs, and possessed power comparable to a Cyclic Derivation expert.

The most frightening part was that they always appeared in huge groups that would fill the sky and were unbelievably ferocious.

Even Lin Xun was reluctant to be tangled up with them because there were always far too many of them, and it was impossible to kill them all.

"A group of experts was eliminated..."

Lin Xun didn’t feel much. He avoided the group of ice snow bats and continued advancing along the lava river.

He had seen such scenes many times over the past four days. There were always people being eliminated somewhere and he had long grown used to the sight.

However, the astonishing rate of elimination still somewhat alarmed Lin Xun.

After all, it was only the first test of the Dao Lantern Festival. If so many heaven prides from the West Infinity World were eliminated here, it was easy to imagine how difficult it would be to pass all the tests and ultimately arrive at the Ancient Dao Lantern Tree.

Hmm?

Lin Xun suddenly paused as if noticing something.

However, he soon continued walking without a change in expression.

Boom!

A few breaths later, however, the ice layer a dozen feet from Lin Xun suddenly exploded as a bright flash of icy light shot straight toward him.

"Kill!"

The same thing happened at several other locations nearby as brightly glowing terrifying attacks rapidly shot toward Lin Xun from various directions.

Fast!

Everything was executed almost instantly and had obviously been planned in advance.

Any other expert would have likely been unable to react to such a sudden surprise attack.

However, Lin Xun seemed to have already anticipated this. Before the first attack could occur, he had already activated the Hornless Ice Dragon Step and disappeared from the spot.

Boom!

All the attacks missed the target and instead blasted a huge crater in the spot where Lin Xun had been standing, causing ice chips to fly everywhere as the land shook.

"Eh? Where did he go?"

"Damnit, the prey is gone."

"Something's not right, everybody be careful!"

Bewildered voices rang out in the vicinity as several young men and women emerged amidst the falling snow. They looked around but could not find any trace of the target.

"Killing and robbing again. In that case, I will give you guys a chance to leave your treasures behind, and I will let bygones be bygones."

Lin Xun's voice sounded across the area. Although there was nothing special about his speech, the words felt like a sudden strike of thunder to the experts, causing their bodies to stiffen as their expressions changed drastically.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

They instinctively fled, dashing off in different directions.

"Looks like I’ll be sending you guys out."

A sigh sounded across the area.

Pff!

One of the youngsters was enveloped by flames before he could react and sustained serious injuries.

"NOOO!"

He shouted in alarm and anger, but it was already too late. A palm seal descended from above and squashed him into the ground, breaking his bones and causing blood to spurt from his mouth and nose in the process.

In another direction, a young lady happened to see this scene. Her scalp turned numb in fear, and she was just about to scream when she felt a sharp pain in her neck. Her vision immediately turned dark as she crumpled onto the ground.

Similar scenes played out in various locations.

Some of the experts managed to flee rather far, but Lin Xun eventually caught up to them, knocked them, and carried them back.

There were also experts who begged for mercy, but they were still knocked out by Lin Xun.

In the end, a total of seven unconscious people were carried back and stacked into a pile.

Lin Xun muttered to himself, "Instead of properly competing, you guys have resorted to robbing others with sneak attacks. You guys are so wicked."

Despite saying that, he swiftly searched their bodies for valuables like a veteran bandit.

The men were stripped down to only their pants and left half-naked on the cold and icy ground.

The women fared slightly better and retained a single layer of clothes at least. However, they were not spared either.

In just a few moments, Lin Xun had collected nine divinity crystals, as well as a few rare pills and medicines.

These men and women were indeed wealthy enough to be known as heaven prides from ancient sects.

Not only did they have a large amount of aeth essences, but they also had various treasures and even several cultivation methods and techniques.

However, Lin Xun only took the divinity crystals, pills, and medicines while leaving the rest of the items untouched.

He didn’t really have a choice. After all, they were successors of ancient sects, and their elders were probably waiting outside Cangwu Mountain. Lin Xun could not take things too far to avoid becoming a ‘public enemy’ of the West Infinity World’s many sects.

When he was done, Lin Xun left a jade strip behind and set off again.

He had encountered several of these sneak attacks over the past four days. However, all of them ended up becoming his victims instead.

They could only blame themselves for being blind fools for failing to recognize Demon God Lin.

……

Gasp!

Not long after Lin Xun left, a gasp sounded in a faraway area as a fatty emerged from the ice. He was dressed in daoist robes and had large earlobes.

His face was twisted in a grimace as he mumbled, "Great deity, that guy is way too ruthless. I can tell with a single glance that he’s also a rotten apple whose technique and experience can more than rival a grandmaster robber...."

As he spoke, he flourished a snow-white horsetail whisk and walked to the group that had been knocked unconscious by Lin Xun.

"Oh, not bad, there are still many treasures left. What a cunning guy. He’s obviously worried about retaliation from the factions these people belong to."

The fat daoist clicked his tongue in admiration. He picked up the jade strip Lin Xun had left on the ground and took a quick look, only for his expression to turn rather strange.

A single sentence was written upon it: "This is a punishment for you guys. If you dare think about robbing me, Sha Liuchan, again, I won’t show any mercy next time!"

Sha Liuchan?

Sha Liuchan my ass!

It was obviously a ploy to make Sha Liuchan take the blame instead!

The fat daoist inwardly cursed. What an evil guy, he wasn’t just good at robbing the robber, but was also a master at framing others!

His eyes swirled in thought as he suddenly laughed. "Heh heh, I know who you are. Tsk tsk, who could have imagined that the fearless Demon God Lin would commit such unscrupulous and devious acts?"

"Interesting, really interesting. This master will also play with you when there’s a chance and let you know who is the true ancestor of dirty deeds. More importantly, I want to find out if you have any Saint artifacts..."

The fat daoist was suddenly itching to meet Lin Xun.

……

Hundreds of miles away, Lin Xun suddenly frowned and turned his head to look back. He had a faint feeling that he had missed something important.

In the end, he shook his head and continued on his way.

Twilight soon approached.

Night arrived as Lin Xun suddenly looked up and saw a giant vortex appear in the sky and release a loud rumbling noise.

At the same time, a terrifying and unstoppable suction force gushed out. Unable to resist, Lin Xun was swept up into the vortex.

"The first test is finally over..." A sliver of understanding dawned upon him.

Meanwhile, similar vortexes appeared in other areas of the Reverse Five Elements Secret Realm and sucked away the other experts.

The experts were relieved instead of alarmed and began to relax as if a heavy burden had been lifted from their shoulders.

They knew that the first test was over, and they had qualified to enter the second test!

As for the experts who were not fated with the second test, they had already been eliminated long ago...