Chapter 73
Chapter 73: Commanding All Trees
Zhao Qing Tu didn’t put away the eight bone mirrors. The guiding dark beam didn’t disperse.
His technique remained in effect.
He followed it at once, chasing without hesitation.
Below, Xu Rong and the others were left staring at the torn barrier, expressions twisted with anger, greed, and unease.
The delicate-featured man—Liang Zheng—rolled his eyes, then raised his voice loudly. “Everyone, don’t worry. Junior Brother Zhao is our Star-Inquiry Sect prodigy disciple. The benefits he promised won’t fall through. He will distribute them later.”
He smiled with forced righteousness. “He would never do something as shameless as breaking his word.”
Xu Rong shot him a look full of scorn, then turned and left without another word.
The others weren’t about to chase either. After being trapped like this, none of them had any interest in helping Zhao Qing Tu hunt down a thief.
Now that probing spells worked again, the lake’s remaining treasures were already gone. People scattered, each eager to salvage their own opportunities elsewhere.
Even while fleeing, Shao Heng didn’t relax. She glanced back and, with her sharp eyesight, saw the same dark beam cutting through the distance toward her.
Zhao Qing Tu was closing in.
He’d mastered a high-level escape immortal art. His figure blurred, then sharpened, then blurred again—each flicker bringing him nearer.
Shao Heng didn’t look back a second time. Three-Thousand-Li Moon flared, and she fled on moonlight once more.
Seven stars flashed around Zhao Qing Tu. His speed surged, faster than hers, and his voice—carried by spirit power—rang out over the forest.
“Fellow Cultivator! I guarded that lake for days, exhausting myself, searching for the treasure meant for me. How could you cut in and steal it?”
His tone sharpened into threat. “Hand it over, and I can still spare you.”
With spirit sense alone, he could tell the person ahead was only mid First Realm. How dare they snatch what he’d waited for?
Shao Heng burst into laughter, sharp and bright, and shouted back without slowing. “Trash is trash. You searched for days and still found nothing?”
“I took the treasure the moment I arrived. If you’re useless, don’t blame others for cutting in.” Her voice turned viciously mocking. “Go grow yourself another brain!”
The tone was familiar—too familiar.
Zhao Qing Tu’s gaze narrowed. Light shimmered in his pupils. Even though he couldn’t see through her true face, he confirmed the distortion of an appearance-changing art.
“Was it you?” he snapped. “The girl who stole my inheritance in the Soaring Moon Realm?”
Shao Heng didn’t bother answering. She drove her escape techniques and Moonlight Phantom Body again and again, spirit power draining dangerously as she searched for an opening—any terrain that could shift the odds.
Ao Chuan’s thoughts surged through the Blood Pact, impatient and heated.
“We should find a place and deal with him! I’m a heavenly demon! I’ve broken through to late First Realm—an ordinary peak First Realm isn’t my match. Your combat strength isn’t bad either. If we find a Vine Demon like before, we might be able to kill this kid.”
“No,” Shao Heng replied immediately.
“A High-Grade Aptitude disciple will be cultivated as a core seed in every immortal sect. Zhao Qing Tu isn’t like Jiang Yun Jiang, who only cultivated for half a year. He may have a life-saving treasure—just like Lu Tian Xiang.”
Her tone hardened. “If we strike and can’t finish him, it won’t end cleanly. It’ll be endless trouble.”
Yet if Ao Chuan didn’t act, Shao Heng lacked sun radiance. She couldn’t merge sun, moon, and stars—her strongest burst method was crippled. Mid First Realm against peak First Realm meant the odds were thin.
The map’s information flashed through her mind. She scanned it once, made her decision, and fled southwest.
As the distance closed, Zhao Qing Tu no longer looked hurried. His gaze fixed on her with cold certainty, like a cat already tasting the kill.
He lifted his right hand. His middle finger slipped through the ring of an Emei spike—flat and narrow, diamond-shaped like a spearhead.
Zhao Qing Tu slashed forward.
A silver-gray wind blade, sharp with cold, cut toward Shao Heng’s waist.
They were already too close.
Shao Heng darted into a dense forest, using tree trunks as footholds. She twisted mid-run and released a rapid volley. Her arrows struck the wind blade with cracking pops, shattering its edge and scattering silver fragments of wind.
In the same breath, she flung out the Thirty-Six Jade Bee Needles.
They shot forward at vicious angles, aiming for vital acupoints from every direction.
Zhao Qing Tu’s left hand flashed—another Emei spike appeared. He spun both weapons in a tight cross, knocking every needle away in a storm of sharp ringing impacts.
Then the black-green bell at Shao Heng’s waist chimed twice.
The sound was thin and eerie, not loud but piercing—an invisible hook that drove into Zhao Qing Tu’s ears and stabbed straight at his spirit.
Pain flared behind his eyes.
His mind went blank for an instant.
That instant was enough.
Four threads of Shao Heng’s spirit sense wrapped around Zhao Qing Tu at once. The Thirty-Six Jade Bee Needles she’d thrown away reversed midair, turning like a flock of lethal birds, and slammed back into his body.
The agony snapped him awake. His brows darkened, and his voice turned hoarse with fury.
“Your spirit sense is actually this strong. That locking method…” His gaze cut toward her like a blade. “Is it from the inheritance you stole from me?”
Shao Heng didn’t answer.
Arguing with stubborn people only wasted time. They didn’t listen. They didn’t believe. The only language they understood was force.
She maintained the spirit-sense lock with everything she had, pinning Zhao Qing Tu in place.
The needles embedded in him spun violently, drilling through bone and sinew, tormenting him with relentless pain.
But Zhao Qing Tu’s foundation was too deep—nearly twice Shao Heng’s. When he erupted with full force, starshine surged through his body. He forced the needles out, blood spraying, and tore free of the lock.
But it was enough.
The death qi hidden in the needles had already seeped into Zhao Qing Tu’s meridians. Under Shao Heng’s control, it erupted like a sudden plague, rapidly draining the vitality from his flesh.
Zhao Qing Tu’s face changed. He staggered, then fell hard to the ground.
He tried method after method, but he couldn’t purge the death qi quickly. It clung like a bone-deep disease, threading through his meridians and refusing to be cut loose.
His wide meridians began to shrivel.
His strong body started to dry and wither.
Shao Heng fired arrows without pause, each shaft wreathed in death qi, pressing him harder and harder.
During the chase, she’d already thought it through. Even with two immortal arts, she couldn’t match a sect prodigy like Zhao Qing Tu who’d cultivated for years. He had deeper methods. More hidden cards.
So she couldn’t meet him on his ground.
She needed to fight with what only she had.
Shao Heng had one advantage neither Zhao Qing Tu nor the Ji siblings could ever reach.
Azure Emperor—ranked among the Great Thousand Divine Ability Rankings.
If the death qi she condensed could be easily dispelled after invading someone’s body, then why would this divine ability be ranked so high?
Shao Heng began to chant.
“Star of Wood Virtue, spirit of the east—follow my nine qi and drive away the evil essence.”
Between her brows, a green-gold, tree-shaped rune formed. Spirit liquid swirled around her like mist. The vines she conjured drank it greedily, swelling thick and powerful, striking toward Zhao Qing Tu like green pythons.
The more she used it, the clearer it became.
The vines nurtured by her spirit liquid were not merely summoned—they were hers. Completely under her control, responding with a precision that felt like an extension of her own limbs.
So the first change of Azure Emperor wasn’t limited to growing herbs or healing wounds.
As long as she was strong enough…
She could command all trees.
Zhao Qing Tu didn’t sit still and wait to die. Gritting through the death qi gnawing at him, he drove his spirit power to the limit. Starshine burst outward, and when the light flared, grass and trees in its path turned to ash.
But Shao Heng stepped forward.
Wherever she moved, green surged up again—shoots, vines, branches—rising as if touched by spring wind.
In pure spirit power, she was still weaker.
But this forest held endless trees and plants.
It was the perfect battlefield for her divine ability.
Under those conditions, the two of them fought to a brutal stalemate.