Aspiring to the Immortal Path

Ninebind City was located on the eastern end of Nadir Hill, close to the border. It was at the intersection of many roads and was in a prime strategic area.

But this was only true for mortals. In the eyes of Immortals, this place\'s open terrain was sparse in spiritual energy, and in this lacking environment, no natural treasures could form, let alone some Immortal mountain to occupy. Thus, there was little meaning in this area, and while there was a big city here, that was because of mortals. To Immortals, this puny piece of ground was far out-valued by a place like Cloudscrape City.

Even so, since Ninebind City was at the intersection of many roads and was near the border, many merchant convoys passed through, so business was good. Every year, cultivators would come here seeking pills and herbs, and on occasion, decent medicines would pop up. It was a place that wasn\'t too valuable, but where one could occasionally be pleasantly surprised.

The Five Energies Sovereign Essence Pill was one of these pleasant surprises.

Standing in front of the gate to Ninebind City, Tang Jie had turned into a dark-faced and burly man as he went through inspection.

Tang Jie\'s recent activities had made it so that the inspection in places all across Nadir Hill had tightened.

But this level of inspection was useless on Tang Jie, though it managed to catch a lot of smaller fish.

There were two cultivators that specialized in Insight on the walls of Ninebind City, but alas, Ninebind City was of too little value in the eyes of cultivators, so these two were of average strength. Their spiritual light scanned Tang Jie but found nothing. The guards at the gate finished their inspection and let Tang Jie through.

Once they were inside the city, Old Fourth Liu, who was behind Tang Jie, walked up and said, "I still think…"

"Shh!" Tang Jie raised a finger.

Old Fourth Liu immediately dropped his head and fell silent.

The two walked for a while before Tang Jie said, "We can talk now."

Old Fourth Liu quickly said, "I still feel that this is too dangerous. This is highly likely to be a trap set by Godhead Palace, luring you out so they can capture you."

Tang Jie chuckled. "I know, but you have to lay down bait to set a trap. Thus, this Five Energies Sovereign Essence Pill is probably real."

"So what?" Old Fourth Liu became frantic. "You\'re seeking death! Don\'t you know that there might be countless cultivators waiting for you inside this city?"

Tang Jie casually replied, "They have to recognize me first. Since they\'ve laid a trap, they have to drop their defenses and invite the prey into the trap. Otherwise, what are they going to do if I decide that I can\'t pull off the heist and leave? And they didn\'t choose Ninebind City for no reason. It\'s precisely because this isn\'t a cultivator town and is relatively safe. Those methods that can see through my illusions won\'t be here… At least before the auction, there won\'t be any."

"I see." Old Fourth Liu understood what Tang Jie was saying. "But what about after the auction begins?"

"That\'s when it\'s time for everyone to show their abilities," Tang Jie replied. "Don\'t worry. If I really can\'t make it work, I won\'t try and force things."

"What I fear is that humans die for wealth as birds die for food!" Old Fourth Liu said, stamping his feet. He didn\'t feel soothed by Tang Jie\'s words at all. They had already come all the way here, so he didn\'t believe that Tang Jie would actually give up.

Tang Jie laughed at Old Fourth Liu\'s words and began to look for an inn to stay at.

There were still three days until the auction, and Tang Jie still had a lot to do in these three days.

Tang Jie spent the entirety of the day strolling around Ninebind City.

This was to familiarize himself with the area and make preparations for what he needed to do next.

One day later, Tang Jie returned to his room and said, "Yiyi."

The little girl jumped out and waved a little hand. Countless plants emerged within the room, weaving together and creating a small model of Ninebind City in the room.

This power was rather similar to the spell art used by the eldest of the 12 Hawks. Through the flower palace Yiyi had created, Tang Jie could make a topographical model. Tang Jie had given it a name: the Jade Model.

Compared to the illusory map of the 12 Hawks, the Jade Model\'s biggest problem was that it couldn\'t be preserved. Its simulation ability relied entirely on Yiyi\'s memory. As time passed and Yiyi forgot, it would become impossible to reproduce the model. Meanwhile, the map spell art used by the eldest of the 12 Hawks was permanent, with no need to worry about forgetting.

This was why Yiyi\'s model had many mistakes.

Fortunately, Tang Jie was here.

His memory was far stronger than Yiyi\'s, and his hands were now like scissors, pruning the model so that it would be more accurate.

As he looked at the Jade Model of Ninebind City, Tang Jie began to wave his hands through the air. Streams of spiritual energy extended from them, falling onto the model and swiftly forming a formation.

A spirit-surveying formation.

This was none other than the first formation Xu Muyang had taught him.

This formation was used to detect the movement of the surrounding spiritual energy, but it could also be used to detect cultivators. Back then, Xu Muyang had used this formation to detect the arrival of Shi Wunian. A Violet Palace Titan like Shi Wunian had ultimately been unable to hide from a junior like Xu Muyang, unable to avoid this little spirit-surveying formation that didn\'t even require materials. From this, it could be seen that elevating one\'s cultivation level was not the only path to the Great Dao.

Tang Jie felt like the auction in two days was bound to be a tough fight.

Before then, he needed to find out who his opponents were and how many of them there were.

He had said that everyone would reveal their abilities at the action, but in reality, an unseen battle was already taking place.

A battle between cultivators wasn\'t just a battle of minds, but also a battle of spell arts. At times, good ideas and plans couldn\'t compare to a single spell art.

What came first was a clash of detection and counter-detection spell arts.

Godhead Palace was anxious to find Tang Jie, so Tang Jie had to evade their detection while also searching for his opponents.

The spirit-surveying formation and the Jade Model were his chosen method.

When these two were combined, they created a formation primarily meant for detecting cultivators.

This spirit-surveying formation was on a much grander scale than the formations Tang Jie had laid out in the past, comparable to Xu Muyang\'s handiwork.

The formation flashed, and then lights of varying intensities appeared on the model, each light corresponding to a cultivator in the city. The intensity showed the strength of the cultivator.

The greatest advantage of using a spirit-surveying formation to find cultivators was that cultivators couldn\'t easily hide from it. Its disadvantage was that it only indicated how strong a cultivator was, not whether they were friend or foe.

The spiritual lights twinkling in the formation didn\'t tell Tang Jie which were additional pursuers sent by Godhead Palace and which were not, but Tang Jie had his own way of telling the difference.

"It\'s already been exposed that I\'m at peak Mortal Shedding Realm, so they wouldn\'t send people of a lower level of cultivation. Even if they did, they would only be lackeys," Tang Jie murmured. He waved his hand, and the lights indicating those below the peak of the Mortal Shedding Realm went out, cutting down the number of lights by a lot.

"Some of the more important areas need to be guarded by cultivators. Outsiders aren\'t allowed to approach these places, nor are they good places to hide. Thus, I can rule out places like the teleportation formation and the storehouse," Tang Jie muttered as he pointed at these locations, extinguishing the lights there.

"Since they\'ve come to capture me, they should have come as a group, organized and moving in unison. Thus, they should be gathered together, and I can rule out the scattered ones." Tang Jie waved his hand, getting rid of more points of light.

Now, there were only two clumps of light on the Jade Model.

One of them had seven or eight points of light while the other had twenty-some points. The former group\'s lights were of about equal intensity, all at around the peak of Mortal Shedding. The other clump had varying cultivation levels. Some were at Spirit Ring, others at the peak of Mortal Shedding, and even some at Nine Revolutions. Tang Jie hadn\'t eliminated those lower-level lights because they had been grouped together with the others.

"The 12 Hawks…" After looking at the two clumps of light, Tang Jie finally turned his gaze to the clump of twenty-some lights.

If everything was as he expected, these were the people Godhead Palace had sent after him. These twenty-some points of light, if he removed those people below Celestial Heart, had twelve people at Spirit Ring, and there were also two at Heart Demon. Tang Jie could tell from this force how seriously Godhead Palace took him.

As for why there were no Soul Transformation cultivators, Tang Jie guessed that this had to do with the wager. For Godhead Palace, Heart Demon cultivators were enough to catch Tang Jie. It wasn\'t important whether they could send Soul Transformation cultivators to catch him. What was important was using this to humiliate Xiao Biehan.

And this was the truth. Two Heart Demon cultivators and a pile of Spirit Ring cultivators were far more than even Tang Jie plus his original body and the ghost guard could take. It wasn\'t important that there were no Soul Transformation cultivators.

But this was from the perspective of a direct confrontation. Outside of this perspective, there were many formidable search spell arts that required powerful cultivators to cast. In these circumstances, lacking a Soul Transformation cultivator created many problems.

Godhead Palace\'s way of thinking was stuck on "confrontation".

This could be considered a common illness of cultivators of this era, believing that sufficient strength meant everything.

The clump of light on the model was located in the western part of the city. Tang Jie took a closer look and found that this was probably a house located on Whitewater Street. But because the model and the formation were not perfectly combined, it was bound to be off, so he still couldn\'t be sure.

Even so, Tang Jie had enough to know who his opponent was.

If he were to throw in a pile of Heavenbane Lightning Pearls…

Tang Jie felt pleased just from thinking about the result. There probably wouldn\'t be any survivors besides the two Heart Demon cultivators.

Alas, even if he did that, he still might not beat those two Heart Demon cultivators. Moreover, in a melee, even cultivators who hadn\'t been sent by Godhead Palace would probably join the battle upon seeing Tang Jie. Most importantly, the auction would definitely be put to a stop, and he would fail to reach his ultimate goal.

Tang Jie decided to throw out the idea. Stroking his chin, he stared pensively at that ball of lights.

—————————————

Meanwhile, in a house on Whitewater Street.

This was an extremely spacious courtyard house.

On the northern side of the courtyard was the main house. Two Heart Demon cultivators were here, their eyes closed in meditation. At their side were two people, their Nine Revolutions disciples who had come along as attendants.

On the western end was the residence of the 12 Hawks. The twelve of them were sharing one room, but it was quiet and peaceful. Occasionally, there would be some whispered conversation.

The eastern room was much noisier.

Five Spirit Ring cultivators were staying here, and one of them was a woman.

A dark-faced man with a curly beard angrily paced back and forth in the room, shouting, "Those motherfucking 12 Hawks! It\'s been five days already, and we still can\'t leave. I\'m about to suffocate to death."

The 12 Hawks clearly knew this man\'s personality, and nobody paid him any attention.

The dark-faced man saw that no one was paying attention to him and continued to curse. His voice alone was enough to make up for everyone else here.

When his cursing went too far, the two Heart Demon cultivators in the northern room would lightly cough, at which point the dark-faced man would rest for a while before cursing again.

This cycle left everyone speechless.

The eldest of the 12 Hawks had ordered that nobody go out. The reason was simply that they wanted to avoid alarming Tang Jie.

But while this order might have been simple enough for anyone else, just a few days of meditation, this dark-faced man considered it torture. He was called Dark Fiend, and nobody knew his real name anymore. In his early years, he wasn\'t like this, but when he had been charging at the Heart Demon Tier, he ended up being possessed by his Heart Demon. Although he had managed to survive, his mind had been ruined, and from then on, he became impatient and unable to sit still.

The palace had sent him because, though he had been possessed by a demon and would no longer be able to advance in cultivation, he had inadvertently grasped a certain spell art, the Lightning Burst Flash. This allowed him to become as quick as lightning for a short period of time, becoming extremely fast and fierce. He was perfect for capturing evasive foes.

He hadn\'t expected that the first thing he would be ordered to do was sit still.

Dark Fiend had already held himself back for five days and was frustrated to the extreme, so he spent every day cursing.

They wanted to let him out, but when they thought about his personality, they worried that he would cause trouble, alarm Tang Jie, and ruin everything, so they could only ask him to restrain himself.

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He had endured inside the room while the others endured him.

After shouting and finding that nobody was paying attention, Dark Fiend finally lost his patience and said, "I\'m done! Don\'t even think about trying to stop me! I\'m going to go out there and find a girl to play around with!"

He strode toward the gate.

The eldest of the 12 Hawks suddenly raised his head and shot over to the door, blocking Dark Fiend. "Dark Fiend, wait a little longer. The auction will begin in two days, and Tang Jie has probably shown up and is hiding in the shadows. If you go out now, he might notice you."

"What does it matter if he notices me? Even if he sees me, how can he be sure I\'m from Godhead Palace? Even if I\'m from Godhead Palace, why should he think I\'m here to catch him? Even if he knew I was here to catch him, what cultivator in Nadir Hill doesn\'t want to catch him? What does any of this have to do with the arrangements we made with the auction?"

This guy spoke with a booming voice, even "the arrangements we made with the auction" being roared out. If Tang Jie had been standing on the street, he wouldn\'t have even needed to check to know that something was awry with the auction. The eldest Hawk was so angry that he almost threw up blood, and he shouted, "Shut your mouth! You want to let the entire city know?"

Dark Fiend knew that he had made a mistake, and after a pause, he helplessly said, "I just can\'t take it anymore, so I can\'t help but complain."

"If you can\'t take it anymore, then go out," a voice suddenly said.

Everyone suddenly turned their heads, but there was nobody there.

The eldest Hawk frowned. "Little Twelve, what are you saying?"

A clear and bright voice resounded through the air, "Better to dredge than to dam. This is Dark Fiend\'s nature. He can\'t sit still for too long, as his impatience will eventually build up into an illness, which might end up ruining things. It might not be a bad thing to let him go out and vent his emotions at a brothel. Besides, Tang Jie isn\'t going to visit a brothel."

Dark Fiend\'s eyes lit up. "So it was the twelfth brother. Twelfth Brother, thank you for speaking up for me. I have long heard of Twelfth Brother\'s outstanding qualities. Back when you entered Mortal Shedding, you were chosen to enter the Hawk Hall, and as soon as you entered Nine Revolutions, you were selected as one of the 12 Hawks. You truly are a handsome and outstanding individual."

He hadn\'t even seen this person\'s face, but he was already calling him handsome, a Spirit Ring True Person flattering a Nine Revolutions child. This was a sign of just how desperate he was to get out.

The eldest Hawk frowned. "I know that Dark Fiend has a very small chance of running into Tang Jie, but we must be careful of any mishaps. Tang Jie must have his suspicions in coming here, and the slightest breeze might have him running off. My Godhead Palace has gone to great lengths to catch this person, and we can\'t let there be any mistake at this crucial moment!"

"This is precisely to prevent any mistakes. Eldest, do you really think Dark Fiend can last another two days? What if he really goes crazy? Then things would really be a mess. If he goes out now, he can rest for the next two days."

Dark Fiend nodded. "That\'s right! Let me have a day of pleasure– no, just one night. After just one night of fun, I won\'t ask for anything else."

The eldest Hawk lowered his head and thought it over.

The unseen twelfth Hawk said, "If you still can\'t relax, let me accompany him."

"You?" The eldest Hawk raised his head, his eyes seemingly piercing through the darkness to gaze upon that hidden existence.

"Yes, I will accompany him. If he dares to ruin our plans… I\'ll kill him."

This Nine Revolutions cultivator was saying that he was going to kill a Spirit Ring True Person, and his tone was extremely calm and collected. Amazingly, nobody listening, including the two Heart Demon True Persons, thought that this was absurd.

The eldest Hawk nodded.

"Alright. You accompany him. I leave everything to you."