Chapter 368: A Talking Teleportation Array

"Boss! There's a demon!" Early that morning, Zou Mo had barely unlatched his door when he was so thoroughly startled he nearly fell flat on his backside.

A mass of dark cloud floated aimlessly within the corridor, carrying with it a harsh, grating roar: "Hahaha! This venerable one is eternal and indestructible, what could such petty tricks possibly do to me!"

Fang Qi had just pushed his own door open, his eyes still heavy with sleep. "Why is it so noisy out here?"

At the far end of the corridor that originally connected Fang Qi and Zou Mo's rooms, a door-shaped carving had suddenly appeared on the wall today.

Yet this door possessed no handle, evidently unopenable from the outside.

Looking closer at the intricate patterns bordering the frame, rather than a door, it might have been more appropriate to call it a formation.

A black-red shroud of gloomy cloud hovered in the upper reaches of the hallway, trailing a faint, ethereal vapor behind it; the further it stretched from the cloud, the thinner it became, until it dwindled into a wisp of silken smoke connected to the very center of that wooden door, which was covered in complex lines and engraved with a pale golden demon's face.

"B... Boss, what is that?!" As a minor cultivator whose cultivation level was lower than almost every customer in the shop, Zou Mo remained somewhat shaken by yesterday's battle even now. Seeing Boss Fang come out, he hurriedly hid behind the man's back.

"You're asking about this..." Boss Fang glanced at the large door beside him, then at the washbasin-sized cloud floating before his eyes. "You haven't kicked the bucket yet, you fellow."

"Of course not!" Within that mass of cloud, a pair of crimson eyes flashed with smugness. "Not only that, this venerable one has recovered quite a bit of power! A mere brat at the Great Martial Grandmaster realm, watch this venerable one blow you all away in a single breath!"

With that, the cloud in midair opened its gaping maw wide, and the surrounding spiritual energy was instantly drawn into its throat.

Its entire body promptly swelled to twice its size, as an exceedingly chilling power gathered within its form.

"Gulp." A strange sound echoed, and a massive glob of spiritual energy flowed down its body, into that tail-like trail of smoke connected to the gilded door, and finally dissolved straight into the portal.

"Whoosh!"

A breath was blown out, but Boss Fang felt nothing more than a gentle breeze caressing his face, and even Zou Mo, standing beside him, was entirely unharmed.

Fang Qi immediately saw that on the system panel, the usage count for the teleportation formation had shifted from "1" to "2".

"Where is this venerable one's demonic power?!" The dark cloud whipped its head back and forth in midair. "How can this be?!"

"Ah—!" The cloud in midair began to shriek frantically on the spot, driven to absolute madness. "You frail humans! Mere humans! How could you possibly strip away the demonic power this venerable one gathered!"

Refusing to accept this absurdity, it took another fierce, deep breath of the surrounding spiritual energy.

"Gulp."

Very quickly, the newly absorbed spiritual energy behaved as if it had entered a funnel, flowing slowly along that silken thread of smoke and into the gilded door.

Boss Fang had already pieced together the situation, and he waved his hand dismissively. "Keep up the good work. Though there probably won't be a bonus, still..."

Boss Fang leaned in close to it, wearing a perfectly harmless smile. "You'll get beaten up less."

"This venerable one does not believe it! Absolutely impossible!" With a furious roar, it gathered spiritual energy once more, while on Boss Fang's system panel, the progress bar for the teleportation formation's usage count continued to creep steadily upward...

Opening the shop door, a rare ray of sunlight pierced through the heavy clouds, illuminating the gloomy city below; though much of it had been laid to waste yesterday, orderly restoration work was now underway, a rebirth from the ashes.

After all, apart from Boss Fang's shop, the surrounding area was essentially a landscape of rubble.

Ruan Ning stood outside the door, directing the reconstruction with immense bravado: "When I finally master the Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation in the future, I am absolutely going to set one up outside the shop!"

Her heart was bleeding at the cost.

Meanwhile, Taoist Tianxu, Wang Lingxiao, and the others were still most concerned with the matter of the demon; they had barely finished arranging the immediate affairs of their respective sects before rushing over without a moment's rest.

"Boss Fang!" Wang Lingxiao cupped his hands. "A bottle of Coke, please!"

"By the way, regarding that demon... how does Boss Fang intend to handle it?"

"Xiao Mo, fetch bottles of Coke for the seniors." Fang Qi instructed Zou Mo to get the drinks while speaking up, "As for that, you can all go upstairs and see for yourselves."

"See for ourselves?" Wang Lingxiao, Taoist Tianxu, Duan Yue, and the others casually took the Cokes handed over by Zou Mo, paid their spiritual crystals, and took large gulps. "Has that demonic creature already been suppressed here by Boss Fang?"

The men quickly hurried upstairs and cast their gazes down the corridor.

There, a mass of dark cloud was spinning frantically in midair, utterly frantic: "What is going on?! This venerable one refuses to believe it! Argh—!"

Taking a massive gulp of spiritual energy, its entire body puffed up like a balloon filled to bursting.

Immediately afterward, its whole form deflated like a punctured ball, and the spiritual energy leaked out completely.

"No! Again!" It fiercely sucked in another breath of spiritual energy.

"Pffft—!" It leaked again.

"Again!" Another breath of spiritual energy.

"Pffft!"

Leaked!

"Pfft—!" The Coke in Wang Lingxiao's mouth sprayed out like an arrow of water, blasting right onto the face of the dark cloud before him.

"..."

And on the other side.

"Junior Sister, do you think I have committed a grave error..." Shui Xianyun, who had finally awakened, sat staring blankly at the head of the bed, her mind filled with a complex tangle of emotions as she listened to her junior sister, Xi Chi, and a crowd of disciples murmuring around her.

"Senior Sister, with such a massive incident occurring, we all share some blame. Furthermore, for these past centuries, guarding the forbidden ground has been the most arduous task among all the major factions, falling upon each successive forbidden ground elder of our Nanhua Sect. You have truly suffered these past hundreds of years, and no one blames you. Besides, though this great catastrophe was immense in scale, rivaling the demonic tribulation of a millennium ago, the major sects primarily lost only material wealth. Do not take it too heavily to heart..."

"In addition, the Sect Master Senior Brother has spoken," Perfected Xi Chi said. "The spiritual energy within your body has become completely intertwined with the demonic qi, to the point where they cannot be separated. Even if we combine the power of the Yimu Dao Palace, the Haoran Sect, and our own—the strength of three sects—there is simply no way."

"So, this cultivation of mine is ruined, is that right?" Her eyes were hollow, as if her heart had long since died.

"That is not quite the case," Perfected Xi Chi shook her head. "There is still one way left now..."

"There is a way?" She shook her head with a bitter smile. "Junior Sister, do not deceive me. If combining the strength of the Yimu Dao Palace, the Haoran Sect, and our Nanhua Sect yields no solution, where else under the heavens could a method possibly exist?"

"Of course there is!" Perfected Xi Chi said with absolute certainty.

"What method?"

Perfected Xi Chi spoke with utmost seriousness: "Eat more instant noodles, one bowl a day. It is best if you add a sausage, too."

Shui Xianyun: "Eat more of what?!"

"Eat more instant noodles!" Mo Xian, standing beside them, explained on behalf of her master. "The instant noodles at the Origin Internet Club are crafted according to a secret, special recipe, possessing an extremely potent effect for purifying spiritual energy. It can help you, Martial Aunt, eliminate the impurities within your body's spiritual energy and promote its circulation. As long as you persist in eating a bowl of instant noodles every day, over time, the impurities within your spiritual energy will be thoroughly cast out."

Shui Xianyun was left utterly dumbfounded: "..."