Chapter 155: Arrival at the Destination

"How did the two of you get here?!"

Cao Chengyu gasped in surprise, genuinely astonished.

Logically speaking, the Heavenly Ruins Mountain Range as a whole was extremely dangerous. Without a group of Purple Mansion cultivators leading a spirit boat, venturing in was practically a one-way trip. Even he maintained guerrilla tactics, trying to shorten battle times as much as possible and quickly extricate himself from the battlefield.

Yet these two bumbling fools had the strongest cultivation among them at merely the Dao Foundation realm; an ordinary ferocious beast could probably take their lives with ease.

"Uh, well..."

Lin Wen panicked, completely at a loss for words.

Lin Qiu was much more quick-witted and explained, "Boss Li, we followed the talisman crane here. But once we reached this place, it stopped moving. Not daring to wander around blindly, we just stayed right here..."

"..." Cao Chengyu.

"So, you followed right behind me? Not even the Immortal-Binding Rope could hold you two?"

"Ah, well..."

The two looked at each other in silence.

Cao Chengyu massaged his temples. Since they had already chased him all the way here, what else could he say? He couldn't just abandon them. Although both of them had their respective flaws, they were ultimately risking danger for the sake of their master.

"Things have come to this, so I can't leave you behind. You may accompany me, but you must strictly follow my commands and not act rashly."

"If your actions trigger a danger I cannot handle, don't blame me for ditching you and running on my own."

"Understood, understood, perfectly reasonable."

The two answered in unison. Lin Wen's mushroom haircut bobbed up and down like a wave. Of the two martial brothers, he was the more timid one, and he immediately followed closely behind Cao Chengyu with a nervous expression, glancing around sneakily.

Cao Chengyu nodded, summoning a patch of white cloud to carry both of them as he continued flying deeper into the Heavenly Ruins Mountain Range.

With two extra people trailing along, it was inconvenient for him to contend for spiritual treasures. Moreover, this transverse mountain range was simply too vast, with spiritual herbs maturing at every moment. It was impossible and unrealistic for him to snatch them all, and there wasn't enough time anyway.

Besides, he had already gained sufficient benefits. It would be much more appropriate to wait until he broke through to the Core Formation realm before coming back in to scavenge another batch of rare resources.

The Heavenly-Sniffing Spirit Cat also could not be exposed just yet.

Along the way, these two had essentially grown familiar with Cao Chengyu.

Lin Qiu was clever and smart. Though his brain would occasionally short-circuit into foolishness, overall he was still sensible, polite, somewhat mischievous, and fond of playing around, but these were not major flaws.

Lin Wen was a different story entirely. With an appearance that was ugly-cute, utterly cowardly, fond of flattering others and taking shortcuts, and prone to doing stupid things whenever trouble arose, he was the definition of a pig teammate, though his nature wasn't bad.

He truly wondered how Daoist Lin had managed to teach his disciples. Raising two such blockheads together meant that even non-blockheads would turn into blockheads—Lin Qiu being a prime example.

Proceeding deeper from the crystal scorpion's territory brought them to the Blood Wolf Ten-Monster Mountains. The subsequent ten tiers of the transverse mountains were the domain of the ferocious blood wolves, who occupied a full ten tiers of territory through sheer numbers and formidable individual combat power. Aside from a certain deficiency in intelligence, they were extremely difficult to deal with.

The thirtieth tier that Cao Chengyu was heading toward was right in the central zone of their territory.

Because of his stupidity, Lin Wen had picked a Wolf-Heart Fruit from the bushes without Cao Chengyu's permission. The fruit was crimson red and the size of a thumb. He hid it away like a treasure, only for Lin Qiu to discover it, leading to a quarrel between the two.

Consequently, the Wolf-Heart Fruit ruptured, and its rich, bloody stench spread for a hundred miles. Within the time it took to burn two sticks of incense, the trio of travelers was surrounded by over a hundred blood wolves.

Adult blood wolves possessed at least Dao Foundation combat power, and their pack leaders were comparable to the Purple Mansion realm. When moving in packs, they could even deploy a blood-qi battle formation, making them quite strenuous to deal with.

Even with his exceptional strength, Cao Chengyu had to exert a great deal of effort to completely annihilate the hundred-odd blood wolves.

And this was merely one of the disasters they had courted, though he was capable of solving it.

Until that fellow Lin Qiu tricked Lin Wen into using a flying corpse to steal a stalk of Scarlet Blood Wolf Grass guarded by a pack of five hundred blood wolves.

Not only was the flying corpse destroyed, but when the wolf pack came charging over howling, Cao Chengyu sensed that the alpha wolf's aura had at least reached the Core Formation combat power. Coupled with their battle formation, it forged them into a single entity. Not only would dealing with them be troublesome, but if it took too long, there was a risk of being besieged by even more blood wolf packs.

After hurling a few angry curses at the idiots, he turned on his heel and left.

For some reason, although he had already walked away and paused for a while on the twenty-ninth tier, preparing to push into the thirtieth tier, a rustling sound came from the brush, and two figures squeezed out. It was precisely them...

"How come the two of you are like dog-skin plaster, impossible to shake off?"

"An accident, an accident, haha..."

Cao Chengyu's eyes narrowed. Under the perception of his divine sense, finding no anomalies on his person, he forcibly snatched the two storage bags to inspect their contents.

"Clothes, pills, talismans, tools, undergarments..."

"Wait, isn't this a scrap of cloth from my vest?"

"Is this how you tracked me down? I don't recall any method in the immortal cultivation world that lets someone track you down just by a piece of clothing."

Seeing Cao Chengyu's expression grow increasingly unkind, Lin Qiu hurriedly explained.

"This isn't a spell; it's just an ordinary talisman crane, researched by our master."

"He calls it a Tracking Talisman. He said that cultivators in the immortal cultivation world are all busy concealing their realm aura and tampering with their own heavenly secrets, rarely studying mortal tracking methods."

"The talisman crane can judge the general direction based on scent. Traveling through the forest inevitably leaves behind broken branches or footprints. As long as the scent profile matches, the talisman crane will follow."

"And even if cultivators travel through the air, they still leave behind a faint trace of air currents."

"You chased me all the way here relying on this?"

Cao Chengyu pondered that this shouldn't be the case. His Heaven-Locking Art was already of superlative grade, making it completely impossible to leave behind a scent. If it was based on physical marks left by movement, that might be possible.

He had minded such things when he was weak, but as his realm grew higher and his enemies were all Core Formation cultivators, he had instead paid less attention to these details.

He had grown slack; this incident could be considered a wake-up call for himself.

The reason Lin Qiu and Lin Wen were able to catch up, besides the traces left behind, was mostly due to sheer luck. Their ability to escape the pursuit of the blood wolf pack was similarly a stroke of fortune.

"Forget it. Since you managed to escape the blood wolf pack's pursuit, it means your time hasn't come yet. Follow along then."

"The next monster mountain is where your master is. We've reached a critical moment; use your brains and stop stirring up trouble."

"Understood, Senior Li. This time we absolutely will not touch anything."

"Alright, come on."

The martial brothers breathed sighs of relief. Lin Wen scratched his calf where a blood wolf had bitten it; the wound felt somewhat itchy, but he said nothing.

It was just a scratch, after all; it shouldn't be anything major.

Little did he know that beneath his trousers, wisps of bloody patterns were spreading along his blood vessels toward his entire body. Wherever they passed, the flesh turned dark and blue, and the veins bulged, yet he felt not a single sensation.

After repeatedly admonishing them not to meddle, Cao Chengyu simply used a white cloud to bind the two of them together. With the destination close at hand, nothing else could go wrong.

And so, that night, the trio finally arrived at their destination: the thirtieth tier of the Heavenly Ruins Mountain Range!