Chapter 203: The Formation in the Cliff

Before them stretched a vast marshland hidden atop the mountains, so large that its end could not be seen. The water didn’t appear deep, but its surface was covered densely with trees and weeds. At first glance, it looked no different from ordinary flat land—yet anyone who stepped onto it would immediately sink into thick mud, unable to free themselves.

Yun Jiao placed a Light Body Talisman on herself, then, together with the Grandmaster, began heading toward the center of the marsh. After walking only a few minutes, they came upon a massive pit ahead. Faint remnants of spiritual energy still lingered around it, and the trees nearby leaned at odd angles, their roots turned up, exposing layers of wet mud. It was clearly the aftermath of an intense battle.

“Girl, over there, over there! We fell off that cliff and that’s when our souls left our bodies,” said the old man, shrinking his soul form and squeezing half of his tiny, miniature self out of the Soul Containment Talisman. He clung to the edge of Yun Jiao’s storage pouch and pointed toward the right.

Yun Jiao turned her head and indeed saw, not far to the right, a broken cliff that seemed to slice the entire marshland in half. As she approached and looked more closely, she found the interior shrouded in mist—so deep she couldn’t see the bottom.

“Daoist Yun, please be careful,” Lao Zhou also squeezed out from the talisman and clung beside the old man at the pouch opening, warning, “Who knows what’s down there?”

Yun Jiao nodded and hesitated, glancing into the abyss before turning to Night Abyss. “Grandmaster, can you see what’s below?”

Night Abyss’s expression darkened slightly. He shook his head. “The spiritual energy is dense and chaotic. It’s hard to discern anything for now. Don’t worry—once we go down, we’ll know.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Yun Jiao felt an arm tighten around her waist—he had already leapt down with her. The rushing wind roared in her ears, startling her into instinctively grabbing onto him. Just as they were about to land, Night Abyss suddenly halted midair.

“Hmm?” He seemed to sense something, frowning.

“What is it?” Yun Jiao was startled. The next moment, she felt strange ripples coming from within the thick white mist below. “It’s the fluctuation of a formation!” She quickly steadied herself, focused her senses, and pointed to the right. “That way!”

Night Abyss immediately flew in the direction she indicated. As they drew closer, they saw a stone wall faintly glowing with runic light—so subtle that it would have been completely overlooked without close inspection.

“There really is a formation!” the old man exclaimed. He stared hard at the patterns, but his soul body grew dizzy just from looking, so he turned to Yun Jiao. “Girl, can you tell what kind of formation this is?”

Yun Jiao leaned in to study it. Though the formation seemed faint and incomplete, its lines extended outward along the stone wall into the fog, making it impossible to see the full structure. She shook her head. “The mist is too thick—I can’t see the entire array. Unless…”

Before she could finish, the man beside her waved his hand. A powerful gust of wind surged upward, swirling like a colossal vacuum cleaner. In an instant, the surrounding mist was completely swept away.

And then—the entire stone wall was revealed.

Everyone present, even the spirits, gasped sharply in shock.

“This… this is…” Lao Zhou’s eyes widened, filled with disbelief.

Even Tang Chen, who had obediently remained inside the talisman, couldn’t help squeezing out to look. The three small soul figures all clung to the edge of the pouch, staring open-mouthed at the massive wall. “This is… a formation?!”

The entire cliff wall was covered with a gigantic formation, spreading across the entire surface. Without the mist, they could now see it clearly—the formation lines extended endlessly across the stone like a spider’s web, layered and intricate, with countless glowing symbols crawling between the rocks. The patterns shimmered and shifted, dizzying to the eye. Had they fallen just a bit further, they would have crashed directly into the array.

“Girl…” the old man said slowly, looking up at Yun Jiao. “Do you recognize this formation?”

“No.” Yun Jiao shook her head. She examined it carefully again—this was indeed a formation she had never seen before. “At a glance, it looks like a sealing formation… or perhaps a trapping one, with traces of soul-locking and soul-devouring woven in. It’ll be troublesome to break.”

“A Spirit-Confining Formation,” Night Abyss said suddenly.

Yun Jiao blinked. “Grandmaster, you’ve seen this formation before?”

“Yes.” His brows furrowed deeper as he spoke in a low tone. “It’s an ancient array, used long ago to seal spiritual veins.”

“Spiritual veins?” Yun Jiao’s eyes narrowed. Tang Chen had said the evil flood dragon had indeed swallowed a spiritual vein, which explained its power. But if it had already devoured it, why was there still a sealing array here? Could it be…

“There’s another spiritual vein sealed inside?!” the three spirits exclaimed in unison.

“We’ll know once we go in,” Yun Jiao said. After carefully studying the formation and calculating for a moment, she pointed ahead to the left. “Grandmaster, the array’s life gate is over there. We can enter through that.”

Night Abyss, who had been about to break the array directly, paused. “…”

Quietly lowering his hand as if nothing had happened, he replied evenly, “Alright,” and flew in the direction she pointed. Yes—follow the little disciple and take the long way around.

Sure enough, they passed smoothly through the formation and descended further below. Unlike the marsh above, the scenery beneath was entirely different. Where the upper cliff had been barren, the area below the array was covered in lush vegetation—vibrant flowers formed a cascading wall of color, and the air was thick with spiritual energy.

These were… spirit plants!

Yun Jiao examined them closely and realized that these plants were all quite old—rare and valuable specimens. She instinctively looked up and saw, right beneath the enormous Spirit-Confining Formation, another familiar one—the Soul-Devouring Formation. That was the very formation responsible for tearing out the old man’s soul when they had fallen.

Had the old man not carried the Yama Token, making his soul stronger than ordinary spirits, the three of them would have been scattered to dust the instant their souls were pulled out.

Yun Jiao’s expression grew even darker. She tugged at Night Abyss’s sleeve. “Grandmaster, their bodies should be directly below us.”

He nodded and sped downward. Within minutes, they reached the bottom.

The ground was blanketed with spirit plants, blooming in wild profusion as if they cost nothing. The spiritual energy was so dense it bordered on excessive—Yun Jiao didn’t even need to draw it in consciously; it was surging into her body on its own.

In just this brief descent, her long-starved spiritual meridians had filled rapidly. Was this… a five-minute fast-charge mode?

Before she could think further, the old man’s excited voice echoed from the pouch. “Girl, there we are!”

She turned and indeed saw three familiar bodies lying not far away, pressed over a thick patch of spirit plants—impossible to miss in the glowing field of flora.

Yun Jiao hurried over, took out the Soul-Guiding Talisman, and released the three souls. Just as she was about to help them return to their bodies, Tang Chen suddenly let out a startled cry.

“Th—that… what is that?!”

(End of chapter)