Everything was a hazy white in front of Bai Yunfei. As if he was wading through a dense fog, Bai Yunfei could hardly even sense what was in front of him with his soulsense. And no matter how deep he traveled into it, it didn’t seem like there was an end to it.

He didn’t really care about that, though.

The elemental energy in this part of the world was drastically more stable than where he was before, and Bai Yunfei smiled knowing that he’d be able to teleport out of here.

He glanced behind him to take a look at his pursuers. Seeing that several streaks of light were still coming after him, Bai Yunfei opted to use the Core Stone to teleport away. One ripple of energy later and Bai Yunfei was teleported away!

“Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom...”

Several beams of light smashed into the ground where Bai Yunfei once stood, scattering the mist with a wild burst of energy. The ground was littered with craters and dust, but no traces of Bai Yunfei could be seen...

Bai Yunfei reappeared a good distance away. He stared at the spot where he had been in with a curious glance. There was a question in mind, but no answer was coming to him. Three seconds later, Bai Yunfei disappeared from that place to teleport away again...

......

Mo Ni and the other soul refiners with him were all parked on the other side of the boundary. They were all staring at the hazy white world Bai Yunfei had run into. How could they possibly find Bai Yunfei in that?

“How...how could this even happen!!!?” A Soul King howled. His entire body shivered with anger as he vented at the boundary.

“Senior...senior Song was defeated?! I can’t believe it! He was a Half-emperor! A Half-emperor!! Every single attack he used could’ve killed a Peak Late-stage Soul King straight off the bat, how in the world did the intruder not die then?! How did he find a way to escape!!?” The Mid-stage Soul King to his side was also looking like he was about to go crazy with how Bai Yunfei had escaped.

“Not only did he steal the King Caging Bell, he used it to capture senior Song! As strong as the King Caging Bell is, it was never so strong that it could capture a Half-Emperor! Then it disappeared...how could he do that!? There’s no way he stored it into a space ring! Not with senior Song inside!”

The Soul King collective was in an uproar. Several Soul Kings were speculating wildly to one another, some were stunned into silence, others were contemplating, and a few were even fearing for the worst...

“The first elder’s awake!! First elder...how do you feel right now?!”

A loud cry silenced every other one. Everyone grew silent to turn to where Qin Bangjie was being held up by several students.

Qin Bangjie was a frightful mess. His entire body was singed and his left arm was gone at his shoulder. Though the wound had been cauterized and staunched, it was still very much a gruesome sight to look at. To make matters even worse, Qin Bangjie’s soulforce reserves was still dangerously low even with the students feeding him their soulforce.

He was at the very least recovering, though.

His eyes fluttered open. His first thought was not of the wounds he sustained, but the environment around him. “Has Bai Yunfei...escaped?”

“......”

No one answered him, but their expression was all Qin Bangjie needed to see. A bitter laugh escaped from his lips. “One person...” He wheezed, “One person did all this! Not even our entire school can stop a single Soul King! An entire school...!”

Blood spilled from his lips after he was seized by a coughing fit, and then Qin Bangjie fell unconscious once again.

A Late-stage Soul King stepped forward to take the students place in transferring soulforce to Qin Bangjie. Administering some additional energy to the man, the Late-stage Soul King waited for Qin Bangjie’s wounds to stabilize.

He and the others were afraid to tell Qin Bangjie the rest of the story. That the Half-emperor senior Song Qing had come to fight Bai Yunfei and was kidnapped by Bai Yunfei.

Then came another burst of light as a group of Soul Exalts came flying towards them from a different direction. At the group’s head was a Late-stage Soul Exalt elder in green robes.

They looked flustered in their flight path and were flying straight for Mo Ni. Rather than bowing in polite greeting to the Soul Kings, the Soul Exalts began to speak to Mo Ni, “Junior headmaster, bad news!”

“What?!” Mo Ni barked in confusion. He thought these Soul Exalts were reinforcements, not bearers of even more bad news. “What happened?”

The entire Soul Refining School was out trying to capture Bai Yunfei and failed. What news could possibly be ‘bad’ in comparison to that?

The elder trembled, as if fearful to say it.

“The...the Black Prison has been destroyed!! All of the jailed have escaped! Elder Feng is trying to capture the ones who escaped, but over half of them are missing right now!”

“What?! The Black Prison was destroyed?! How can that be!?”

Another round of shock went through the group. Mo Ni, in particular, had a face that was as white as chalk. This was terrible news!

Elder Feng was a Late-stage Soul King, so Mo Ni thought it was strange that he hadn’t come to help them capture Bai Yunfei. He had been dealing with the Black Prison breakout then? That must’ve been why several others didn’t rally here.

“A report from a surviving student says that a newly instated guest elder is responsible.” The Soul Exalt reported swiftly. “That elder was reported to wear a golden mask and has a silver iris. He spoke to the elder-in-charge saying that he had suspicions of the intruder hiding there. When refused, he and the students there were killed. The people we jailed there were let out and...the entire place was destroyed!”

“Damn damn damn!!” Mo Ni cursed. “Return to the school grounds!!” He motioned to the Soul Kings behind him, “Find the escapees and bring them back!!”

He was close to blowing his top. If Bai Yunfei escaping wasn’t bad enough, there was now a group of prisoners that escaped?! What kind of conclusion was this?!

......

From within the area of mist, a ripple of energy disturbed a piece of the area there before a person stepped out from it.

“Where is this place...?”

Bai Yunfei muttered to himself. He grunted in pain the next second. “I can’t hold on much longer!”

He dove straight for the ground. As soon as he hit soft ground, Bai Yunfei disappeared into thin air.

And in his place, a pebble fell some distance down from the air to fall in between two leaves.

Within the Core World.

Bai Yunfei fell onto the ground within the Core World with a gasp. Undoing Berserk Mode and Soul Ignition, Bai Yunfei crumpled and laid there as if powerless.

Then...he began to let loose a pain-filled howl!

“Ahhhh!!!!”