Chapter 72: Getting Pulled Inside An Illusion

Chapter 72: Chapter 72: Getting Pulled Inside An Illusion

Shi Yan, or rather, the Lady Boss of Yaomei Pavilion, had finally revealed her true form.

She was surprisingly already at the Nascent Soul stage. This also explained how she had managed to break free from the formation so easily.

Although the formation had been passed down by the Xu family specifically to suppress demons, its power ultimately depended on the strength of the people operating it. The Xu family’s ancestors had been far stronger in the past, so the formation had once possessed considerably greater power. However, the formation they used had been activated only by several Golden Core cultivators, so its suppressive power was naturally limited to that level.

Against a demon whose cultivation was at the Golden Core stage or below, the formation would have been extremely effective. But against a Nascent Soul demon, although it still worked, its suppression was greatly weakened. And if the demon being suppressed also happened to understand formations well enough to find and dismantle the formation from within, then the formation would be unable to restrain them for long.

The Lady Demon lowered her gaze toward the cultivators scattered across the ground. To her, their unconscious bodies seemed no different from lifeless corpses.

A pleased smile slowly spread across her lips.

"Well, I wasn’t planning to do this, but since it has already come to this, you might as well become my nourishment to keep everyone silent."

Hearing this, Sui Sui suddenly felt that something was wrong.

His gaze fell toward the ground beneath the Demon’s feet. The dark purple smoke that had been lingering around her was spreading outward at an alarming speed, creeping across the ground like countless thin strands of ink.

Sui Sui quickly looked around at the others, but none of them seemed to notice the strange smoke spreading beneath the Demon. They continued standing where they were, completely unaware of what was happening

A bad feeling immediately rose in his heart.

"Everyone Run!" Sui Sui shouted. "She’s setting up a large-scale formation!"

The moment his voice fell, the ground beneath them suddenly trembled.

Countless dark purple light erupted from beneath the earth, spreading in every direction at an astonishing speed. They intertwined with one another, forming an enormous network of runes that covered the streets, buildings, and rooftops. In merely a few seconds, the entire city had been enveloped by the formation.

Then—

A stronger purple light suddenly shot into the sky, blinding everyone present.

One by one, everyone started to fall down

When the light ceased, everything had gone quiet. The wedding gongs and music from earlier were gone, along with the sound of people’s laughter and chatter. It was as if the entire city had been plunged into a deep sleep.

The demon in red hovered above the city, gazing down at the streets that had been drowned in silence.

What she had just unleashed was one of the Qingmei Demon Clan’s forbidden arts—a wide-range illusion spell capable of enveloping an entire city. Like an invisible web, the spell spread through every street and alleyway, silently drawing every inhabitant into unconsciousness.

Within the illusion, each victim would experience a different dream, one shaped by the deepest desires, regrets, and greed buried within their hearts. Some might dream of wealth, others of power, love, revenge, or things they had lost and desperately wished to regain. As long as there was something they desired, the illusion could use it to construct a dream from which they would be reluctant to awaken.

It was an extremely difficult spell to cast.

The demon in red had spent a full decade laying down the formation throughout the city, carefully concealing its traces so that no one would discover what she had been preparing. Originally, she had never intended to activate it right now.

At least, not yet.

She had planned to keep the formation hidden until she found what she was looking for, but things had developed differently from what she expected.

Now that matters had reached this point, she could only activate it.

She was going to drain everyone’s life force first to aid her own cultivation before laying waste to this place.

As the thought crossed her mind, a strange object suddenly appeared in her hand. It was a small hourglass, its transparent body filled with fine, dark-red sand. The sand had already begun to fall from the upper chamber into the lower one, grain by grain, steadily and without pause.

It was a countdown.

Once the last grain of sand fell, the life force of everyone trapped within the city would have been completely drained.

"It is just a pity that I wasn’t able to find the person with the Extreme Yin Body. My Lord will definitely not be happy about this. Twenty years of waiting here, all for nothing," the woman in red said with a faint, indifferent sigh, her voice carrying little more than mild disappointment. She said it aloud, not caring if anyone heard her. After all, there was no one awake to hear her anyway.

What the woman in red didn’t know was that there was indeed someone who was still awake.

Hidden behind one of the fallen buildings, Sui Sui lay motionless on the ground. He didn’t dare move, afraid that even the slightest movement might attract her attention.

He still didn’t know how he had managed to remain conscious when the entire city had fallen under the illusion spell. However, as he glanced at the faintly glowing moon-shaped mark on his arm, he had a rough idea.

When the explosion had happened earlier, his first instinct had been to enter his private dimension. At that point, he didn’t care if anyone saw him. Staying alive was more important. However, before he could fully activate the dimension, the formation had already reached him, interrupting the process.

Yet, somehow, he had still managed to remain awake.

Perhaps the moon-shaped mark had another use besides allowing him to enter his private dimension.

Sui Sui didn’t know for certain, and he had no time to investigate it now. Whatever the reason, he had somehow avoided falling unconscious like everyone else.

For now, the situation was far more urgent.

Beside him, Yizhou was unconscious, most likely also trapped under the spell cast by the demon. His brows were tightly furrowed, as though whatever he was experiencing in his dream was far from pleasant.

Seeing this, Sui Sui first tried to wake him by gently shaking his shoulder. When that didn’t work, he tried pinching him, but no matter what he did, Yizhou showed no response.

Sui Sui could only think of another way.

If his guess was correct, then the spell the demon had cast should be an illusion spell. The Qingmei demons were especially skilled in illusion techniques, capable of trapping people within their range while attacking them mentally.

Sui Sui wasn’t very knowledgeable about illusion spells. He had only recently begun cultivating, and his understanding of such techniques was mostly limited to what he had read in books. Still, there was one thing he remembered that might be useful.

The dual cultivation technique.

He could try using his own spiritual energy to enter Yizhou’s consciousness and guide him out of the illusion, he had to be fast, because he felt that if he wasted more time, not only him but everyone else here would die.

Sui Sui wasn’t entirely sure how to break someone free from an illusion. From what he had read, the key was for the person trapped inside to realize that they were in an illusion. That was difficult for ordinary people to accomplish, especially when their minds were completely immersed in the dream.

It was also extremely difficult for another person to interfere with someone else’s spiritual consciousness because most cultivators would never allow another person to enter their consciousness so easily.

Fortunately, Sui Sui and Yizhou were already familiar with each other’s spiritual energy.

At the very least, he should be able to try right?

Sui Sui quickly gathered his spiritual energy into his palm and pressed it against Yizhou’s palm.

The moment their palms touched, Sui Sui felt Yizhou’s spiritual energy.

It was a familiar presence, one he had already sensed many times before, but trying to connect with it like this was completely different from simply sensing it from the outside. Sui Sui carefully pushed his spiritual energy forward, trying to make contact with Yizhou’s.

Nothing happened.

The difference in their cultivation was simply too great. Yizhou’s spiritual energy was far stronger than Sui Sui’s, and because he was trapped in the illusion, it had become chaotic and unstable. His body had also activated its own protective mechanisms, making Sui Sui’s attempt to enter his spiritual energy feel like trying to force a small stream into a vast, turbulent river.

He gritted his teeth and increased the amount of spiritual energy he was releasing.

A faint resistance came from Yizhou’s palm.

Sui Sui stopped for a moment, then slowly continued, carefully guiding his spiritual energy rather than forcing it forward. He released more of his own energy, allowing it to mix with the familiar aura instead of trying to overpower it.

Gradually, Yizhou’s spiritual energy began to respond.

The two energies intertwined, flowing between their palms before slowly spreading through Yizhou’s meridians. Sui Sui could vaguely sense the path his spiritual energy was taking, but he did not dare move too quickly. If he disturbed Yizhou’s spiritual energy or accidentally caused it to clash with his own, he could end up making things worse.

Once the connection became stable, Sui Sui carefully extended his spiritual energy deeper.

He wasn’t trying to interfere with Yizhou’s cultivation. His goal was to find his consciousness.

Sui Sui followed the flow of spiritual energy, slowly searching through the depths of Yizhou’s spiritual sea. The deeper he went, the more difficult it became to maintain the connection. Yizhou’s spiritual energy was simply too powerful, and Sui Sui had to continuously supply his own energy just to keep himself connected.

After searching for some time, he finally noticed something different.

In the depths of Yizhou’s spiritual sea was a strange region completely unlike the golden spiritual energy he had sensed before.

It was black.

The darkness gathered together like an endless abyss, and an oppressive aura came from within it. Even though Sui Sui was only sensing it through his spiritual energy, he instinctively felt a sense of danger.

It was as though there was something hidden inside that darkness, something capable of swallowing everything that came near it.

Sui Sui hesitated if he should approach or not.

Because he could sense Yizhou’s consciousness somewhere inside that place.

If he wanted to help him, he had to go in.

But this place made him uneasy.

After hesitating for a moment, Sui Sui carefully extended a few strands of his spiritual energy toward the darkness.

Nothing happened.

He waited before slowly sending in more.

The dark energy remained still, and Sui Sui gradually became bolder. He tried spreading his spiritual energy around it, hoping to calm and guide Yizhou’s consciousness out of the illusion.

However, the moment he extended his spiritual energy deeper, the darkness suddenly moved.

Sui Sui’s expression changed.

A powerful force suddenly pulled at his consciousness.

At first, the force was weak enough for him to resist. He immediately tried to withdraw the spiritual energy he had extended, but before he could completely pull it back, countless strands of dark smoke surged out from the abyss.

They wrapped around his spiritual energy like tentacles.

Sui Sui tried to sever the connection, but the moment he did, the dark strands tightened.

The force pulling him inward grew stronger.

His consciousness was dragged forward before he could react.

Sui Sui struggled desperately, trying to retreat from the dark abyss, but his resistance was useless. The darkness continued to pull him deeper until his entire consciousness was swallowed by it.

Then everything went black.

When Sui Sui’s consciousness woke up again, he realized that he was in another place.