Martial Peak

This puppet had a strange appearance, looking like a large lizard walking upright, with short forelimbs, extreme long hind limbs, and an inexplicable, hideous atmosphere lingering around its body.

As soon as it looked at Yang Kai, it immediately opened its big mouth and sprayed out a bright red light.

“A casual attack has the same strength as a Dao Source Realm’s strike? These puppets… are quite extraordinary!” Yang Kai felt the intensity of the energy of this ray of light and his expression changed slightly as he immediately dodged.

*Sou…*

The beam of light barely missed Yang Kai’s body and hit a cultivator who came in right after him.

This cultivator was lucky, however, because before he came in, he had worn a defensive Artifact Armour.

His original intention was to prevent Wu Chang from suddenly killing him, but now, this Artifact Armour had coincidentally saved him from this attack.

*Hong…*

The cultivator couldn’t help stumbling back a few steps as his Artifact Armour flashed wildly, a moment later calling out in surprise, “What the hell was that?”

At that moment, a large number of people rushed in from the entrance, and even Gong Wen Shan who came in last showed his face.

It could be said that among the cultivators who stayed outside the Flowing Time Temple before, apart from the few who were killed by Wu Chang, only three were excluded from entering.

With more life auras appearing, the puppets that were besieging Xiao Chen and the others in the first group began to disperse to target these new enemies. Xiao Chen and the others were suddenly relieved of some pressure and immediately launched a counterattack, smashing the puppets which had turned their backs on them, causing many to break apart and fall to the ground.

Without exception, each of the crushed bodies of these puppets would contain a crystal about the size of a fist that gave off rich energy fluctuations.

“Spirit Energy Heart!” Someone exclaimed as they stared greedily at the crystal.

Yang Kai’s heart was also moved as he instantly realized what this thing was.

Spirit Energy Hearts were the core component of a puppet, and without them, no matter how well crafted a puppet was, it would simply be a dead object. Only by inserting a Spirit Energy Heart would a puppet be able to operate independently.

However, Spirit Energy Hearts were extremely difficult to refine and required the cooperation of an Artifact Refining Grandmaster as well as a Puppet Master, so their value was extremely high, especially high-grade Spirit Energy Hearts which were almost impossible to find nowadays.

There were several hundred puppets in this hall, and each one was at least Dao Source Grade; in order words, there were hundreds of Spirit Energy Hearts here!

If one could bring all these Spirit Energy Hearts out and find a Puppet Master to refine bodies for them, one could create a Dao Source Realm grade puppet army!

Cultivators such as Xiao Chen, Kong Qi, and Xiao Bai Yi, who were born into peak level forces, may not care too much about the value of these Spirit Energy Hearts, but for those who were born into small Sects and families, it was a different story. Smaller forces often found it hard to cultivate Dao Source Realm Masters, but with these Spirit Energy Hearts, they could create a Dao Source Realm powerhouse.

Faced with such a prospect, how could a competition not begin? Even if their own Sect couldn’t refine a proper puppet body, just selling these Spirit Energy Hearts would net a lot of Source Crystals.

So, after experiencing the initial panic, all the cultivators who rushed in became filled with enthusiasm, summoning their artifacts one after another while attacking the puppets viciously.

Even though the number of puppets was massive, and their strength was not too high, with no one to drive and coordinate them, they were unable to use their full strength or take advantage of their numbers, so the tide of battle quickly turned against them.

The cultivators who rushed in didn’t hold back, the weaker ones forming groups of three to five to besiege their targets while those who were confident in their strength fought single-handedly. It was not long before the number of puppets was halved, and the price the attacking cultivators paid was extremely small, only a few people being seriously injured with not a single person dying.

Yang Kai also took the opportunity to kill a few puppets and harvest some Spirit Energy Hearts which he tossed into his Space Ring.

As time passed, the number of puppets in the hall became less and less; inspiring the cultivators even further, causing the puppets to be cut down even faster than before.

Suddenly…

A dazzling light burst out from somewhere in the crowd, catching everyone’s attention.

Floating mid-air, a star-shaped ray of light flickered slightly before suddenly transforming into a stream of light and sinking into a male cultivator’s arm.

The cultivator didn’t understand what was going on and only felt a burning pain in his arm, causing him to call out in alarm.

“A five-pointed Star Seal!” Lan Xun’s beautiful eyes lit up and she shouted softly.

“These puppets… actually have Star Seals on them?” Xiao Chen swept his eyes across the remaining puppets around him, searching for other Star Seals.

He had already cut down seven puppets, but such a good deed had not fallen to him yet, making Xiao Chen feel a little uncomfortable.

“Ah? This is a Star Seal?” The male cultivator was dumbfounded for a moment after hearing Lan Xun’s tender call, but he soon grinned happily and shouted, “I actually obtained a Star Seal? Hahahaha, it looks like Heaven is truly taking good care of me!”

He was overjoyed and laughed.

Even if some people around him didn’t like his public bragging, they could only envy him.

However, after this scene, everyone’s interest in killing these puppets increased dramatically, and their attacks intensified once more.

In a certain part of the hall, a man and a woman, seemingly fellow Sect disciples, were nervously attacking a leopard-shaped puppet.

This puppet looked almost indistinguishable from a real leopard and was extremely flexible in its movements, but fortunately, this puppet seemed to only be able to perform melee attacks.

So, even if the strength of these two people wasn’t very high, they had a good chance of defeating this puppet.

It was not the strength of this leopard puppet that made them nervous, however, but rather the triangle mark on its forehead!

This mark wasn’t eye-catching, but if before now this pair hadn’t paid much attention to it, after experiencing the scene just now, how could they not guess it was a Star Seal?

Earlier, several dozen Star Seals had fallen into the Flowing Time Temple and were likely hidden throughout it now, so it wasn’t a surprise that among these hundreds of puppets, a few Star Seals would appear.

This Senior Brother and Junior Sister pair weren’t from a big Sect, nor was their strength too great, so they were worried that if they killed this leopard, the Star Seal would reveal itself and draw unwanted attention towards them…

Although the man who just obtained that five-pointed Star Seal was currently ecstatic, there was no doubt he had also become a target who would be attacked as soon as other people had some attention to spare.

Thinking so, this Senior Brother and Junior Sister pair exchanged a glance and nodded to each other. Instead of immediately defeating their target, they began leading the leopard away into the depths of the temple, trying to escape from everyone’s line of sight so they could secretly obtain this Star Seal.

With the chaotic melee occurring in the hall, even if the actions of these two were a bit suspicious, no one would care about them and would likely just assume they weren’t strong enough and were being forced back.

The strategy these two employed was quite successful, but just as they were about to move far enough from the crowd to not draw attention, a figure suddenly fell from the sky and smashed his fist down fiercely.

The hearts of the pair suddenly sank, but it was too late for them to react.

A loud thud followed.

The leopard-shaped puppet was directly smashed to pieces, and at the same time, the triangle mark on its forehead flew out in a burst of light before falling towards the figure which had just appeared.

“Just a triangle Star Seal?” The figure glanced at the back of his hand and muttered in seeming dissatisfaction before turning around and attacking another puppet.

Seeing this, the woman from the Senior Brother Junior Sister pair bit her red lip and opened her mouth to say something.

However, her Senior Brother’s expression changed dramatically as he hurriedly pulled her back and slowly shook his head, explaining in a low voice, “That’s Luo Yuan… we can’t afford to offend him.”

“But that Star Seal…” The woman looked unwilling.

The man gave a helpless smile, “Just treat it as if we never saw it.”

“It was obviously ours though!” The woman pouted in annoyance. If they had known that Luo Yuan would suddenly rush over to steal their prey, they would have just destroyed the leopard instead of allowing it to fall into another’s hands.

After the man soothed his Junior Sister for a while, he somehow managed to persuade her to not find trouble with Luo Yuan.

This man understood that there was no point in trying to discuss this matter with Luo Yuan. If one wanted to say something to him, they had to speak with their fists.

The battle in the hall lasted for roughly an hour, with several dozen Dao Source Realm cultivators from major Sects families in the Southern Territory paying a small price to wipe out these puppets.

Without even mentioning the Spirit Energy Hearts, just the three Star Seals which appeared were a massive gain. In addition to the five-pointed Star Seal and the triangular Star Seal Luo Yuan obtained, another diamond-shaped Star Seal appeared.

This last Star Seal was fortunately obtained by Murong Xiao Xiao, causing her to smile happily because now she was qualified to enter the Shattered Star Sea and seek her own path to the Emperor Realm.

Only now did everyone have an opportunity to examine the hall itself.

This entry hall was massive, and at the moment was covered in puppet fragments; however, there was just one obvious passage leading away from it, which seemed to be the only exit.

There were no puppets guarding this exit, and no trace of any barriers or Spirit Arrays protecting it, so it seemed quite safe.

Despite that, no one approached this exit carelessly. Everyone first found a place to sit down cross-legged to restore themselves while waiting for someone else to take the lead to explore the way forward.

Kong Qi of Seven Glories Chamber of Commerce quietly made his way over to Gong Wen Shan and asked with a pleasant expression, “Brother Gong, what do you think of the situation over there?”

Gong Wen Shan squinted his eyes before turning to him and saying, “Brother Kong, you’re… even more thick-skinned and shameless than the last time we met, asking me about everything here. How should I know? It’s not like I’ve been to this Flowing Time Temple before.”

Kong Qi grinned meaningfully and replied, “Those with great capabilities have greater responsibilities. With Brother Gong’s knowledge of Spirit Arrays, if there was any danger there, you would be the first to notice it.”

“Now you’re even shamelessly flattering me…” Gong Wen Shan snorted before he stood up reluctantly, walked over, and muttered. “Fine then, I’ll take a look.”