Chapter 540: Straight to the Point

Chapter 540: Chapter 540: Straight to the Point

Can the Sect Protection Array monitor the movements of demons in this world? Most likely, yes, since demons also gather Spiritual Qi, and the possibility of breeding Inner Demons can’t be ruled out.

Maybe it won’t keep an eye on small Mountain Demons or Earth Spirits, but for Great Demons like the Cyan Dragon Vortex, the array should remain vigilant.

However, the array’s focus should not be limited to this alone.

There is a resource that is the core asset of the Lotus Cloud Sect: the civilians living in this world.

According to Ji Lian’s concept, she has to guard against survivors banding together to form organizations similar to the Immortal Alliance, accelerating the breakthrough efficiency of cultivators, and also prevent them from being massively slaughtered by demons or from internal wars becoming too disastrous, leading to rapid population decline.

After all, the existence of the Pocket World is to provide a place for humanity to survive.

If everyone dies out, then the Lotus Cloud Sect loses its meaning of existence.

Chen Xuan speculated that this is why the Nine Department Judges would receive warnings about demons.

He himself is not a demon, and a Loose Cultivator might misjudge, but the Sect Protection Array would never make such a basic mistake.

The reason he triggered the alarm is likely the first point: a large number of villagers crossed the Qi Sensing threshold in a very short time, gaining cultivation talent. A large gathering of cultivators can easily form a collective representing their own interests, which infringes on the core interests of the Lotus Cloud Sect.

The evidence is that the Demon-Hunting Letter doesn’t even have a specific location or description of demon characteristics. The array perceives a different threat and cannot directly pinpoint the culprit, Chen Xuan.

If the source of the Demon-Hunting Letter really is the Sect Protection Array, then the problem becomes somewhat troublesome.

Ji Lian set up this system naturally hoping that people living in the Pocket World would hardly sense the world’s oddities, relying on batches of Immortal Masters to adjust and maintain the fragile balance of this world.

But when a real threat appears, will the Sect Protection Array sit idly by when it finds the Immortal Masters losing their effectiveness in checks and balances?

Chen Xuan bets it won’t.

The array’s response will gradually escalate, and the confrontation will become more intense until the sect’s forces personally intervene. It’s like an immune response — unless the threat is completely eradicated, the Sect Protection Array will never stop.

In other words, either he disperses the villagers of Baihe Village and finds another route to accumulate Spiritual Qi, or he faces increasing levels of confrontation.

Neither path is one Chen Xuan wants to take.

So he decided to reveal his intentions ahead of time and have an honest conversation with the incarnation of the Sect Protection Array, namely Wei.

Chen Xuan doesn’t plan to go to Kunlun Peak. It’s too far away and blocked by storms, making it difficult to reach with just a mortal body. Besides, he doesn’t have a jade token at the moment, and even if he reaches the Lotus Cloud Sect’s location, he might not be able to call the mountain gate.

More importantly, if the Sect Protection Array really is monitoring the Pocket World, he can contact the other party wherever he is.

The depths of the valley in Earth Slope Mountain are no exception.

Chen Xuan pointed to the sky with one hand, starting to gather Spiritual Qi.

He intended to perform an "Demon-Slaying True Sword" here that would shake the entire Pocket World.

A dazzling multicolored radiance appeared above his fingertip.

Life force continuously flowed into it, quickly exceeding the lifespan limit of a normal cultivator.

Essentially, lifespan refers to the intensity and breadth of a cultivator’s bloodline propagation—ordinary people can’t drive the "Demon-Slaying True Sword" because their blood and flesh almost contain no fused Spiritual Qi. Only those with innate ability can draw in Spiritual Qi, temper themselves, and thus nurture flesh strong with Spiritual Qi.

When Liu Shuyue sacrificed her life to slay demons, Chen Xuan traded "Black Magic" with her to absorb a Great Demon’s life force using the dragon’s heart as a sacrifice, which was a lucky hit in fact. If she had sacrificed something other than a Demon Heart, like the heart of an ordinary animal, the life force returned wouldn’t have been enough to counteract the side effects of the Demon-Slaying True Sword.

However, Chen Xuan had no such worries; his flesh, brimming with Spiritual Qi, was his most abundant resource.

If the average life force of a Loose Cultivator is ten, a Lotus Cloud Sect Immortal Master might have a hundred, and he had already injected ten times an Immortal Master’s life force into the radiance.

To him, this was merely the beginning.

Rustling...

Suddenly, there was a burst of fluttering sounds in the forest.

A large flock of birds was startled awake, instinctively sensing a dangerous aura, beginning to flee the area in panic. Even with the risk of night blindness causing them to plummet, they were unwilling to linger a moment longer in the valley.

The radiance kept expanding, quickly surpassing the mountain top, stretching towards the boundless night sky.

It didn’t dispel the night.

It didn’t even illuminate the forest around Chen Xuan.

Because it wasn’t true light at all; it was a mental projection formed by the surge of Spiritual Qi—the Demon-Slaying True Sword longed to be seen, representing the caster’s final flicker of life.

Perhaps the creator of this technique never imagined it would one day be used by someone whose life force far exceeded normalcy, and the purpose of using it was merely to awaken the guardians of the Pocket World.

The mighty strike that Liu Shuyue unleashed once briefly tore open the Pocket World Barrier, creating an erosion passageway between this world and Jiang City.

This wasn’t entirely Liu Shuyue’s doing; perhaps there were already invasion points between the world lines, and her strike might have disrupted the array’s stability, conveniently exposing a flaw.

But Chen Xuan obviously intended to turn this chance occurrence into a certainty.

Should this strike be unleashed, not only would it create an invasion point, but it might transform the entire Earth Slope Mountain into an Erosion Zone!

As for whether the other side connects to Jiang City or another world, even he couldn’t guarantee.

The multicolored radiance unfolded completely in the sky, like a silk ribbon cascading from the dome, with massive amounts of Spiritual Qi spiraling around it, forming what seemed like a colossal storm over the valley.

Chen Xuan also felt a bit strained; the shadow of the sword at his fingertip seemed to awaken, beginning to shake the owner’s control in reverse. It not only accelerated its extraction of Chen Xuan’s life force but also struggled more fiercely—it wanted to unleash this strike, to shred any foe standing in its path.

It couldn’t drag on any longer.

Chen Xuan’s mind focused, his right hand turning from pointing to grasping, and the multicolored radiance, sensing his will, joyfully swooped down, manifesting in the form of a sword!

This was akin to condensing a storm capable of covering Earth Slope Mountain into a single point!

Once wielded, the eruptive power would surely be earth-shattering.

"Stop!"

In that instant, a pure white female figure suddenly appeared in front of Chen Xuan; her body showed no detail, as if merely a sketch on a white page.

Finally, they came.

Chen Xuan raised the corners of his mouth, promptly halting the casting of the Demon-Slaying True Sword.

Almost simultaneously, the figure lifted a hand in a virtual grab, fixing him in place. In the next moment, the surrounding scenery turned entirely white, with the woods and mountains vanishing, leaving him seemingly in a void space where even his body lost its sense of realism.

Yet Chen Xuan remained unflustered.

This wasn’t his first time here.

He nodded towards the figure, greeting it, "Hello, Wei."

The female figure paused slightly, then spoke in a stern voice, "I do not have a name."

"True, for now. But just because you don’t currently have a name, doesn’t mean you never will," Chen Xuan said nonchalantly, "Rest assured, I am not your enemy, nor do I wish to destabilize the Lotus Cloud Sect Array."

Wei hesitated for a second, then fiercely questioned, "Who exactly are you?"

"I am the mentor of Ji Yun and Ji Lian, don’t you remember?" Chen Xuan replied with a smile.