Chapter 170: Chapter 72: The Battle Draws to a Close

Li Jizhou merged with the coconut tree, not paying much attention to the actions inside the array, but continuously searching outside the array.

At the moment the array was activated, it enveloped everyone on the main island, but a few people remained outside the array.

Those with magical power auras were Foundation Establishment cultivators, all consciously retreating outside the array, not many in number, barely a hundred in Li Jizhou’s view, and they were dispersed.

Suddenly, Li Jizhou sensed through his sense of age a cultivator with a life span limit of three hundred and two years. This person was disguised as an unremarkable middle-aged man at the Foundation Establishment Stage, mingling among the sparse allied soldiers outside the array.

“Could these people be from the array Liu family, the current rulers of the Chu Kingdom?” Li Jizhou immediately thought of the Liu family, closest to this sea domain.

After all, besides the Liu family, no force south of the barren spirit land of the Qi Kingdom had such high attainments in arrays.

Setting up a tier-three killing array encompassing the main island in just half a day was a testament to their ample preparation and skilled craftsmanship.

They must have meticulously surveyed the area around the main island beforehand, pre-refined the array base materials, and even pre-engraved the array patterns on those materials, only needing to lay them at the scene.

Moreover, maintaining such a tier-three killing array is not cheap, requiring at least tier-three primary materials as the array hub and tier-two materials as the foundation stones, spread around the main island, and activating the array without hundreds of middle-grade spirit stones was almost impossible.

The total cost exceeds ten thousand spirit stones, not including some rare materials.

“For the Liu family to traverse thousands of miles to the sea domain and spend such a fortune helping Qianhu Island set up the array, the benefit exchange involved is probably no less than ceding land and paying indemnities.”

Li Jizhou pondered for a moment and roughly guessed the Liu family’s intention.

The mineral resources and materials in the sea domain indeed greatly aided arrays.

However, the Liu family had few people, and their clan was based on arrays, with individual cultivators’ strength being secondary.

Even if they wanted to monopolize the entire Five Elders Association sea domain, it would be impossible.

Moreover, relative to the Foundation Establishment cultivators, some key resources in the sea domain were still too scarce, not up to par with the mainland.

Furthermore, they already occupied a third-tier spirit vein in the Chu Kingdom, with higher spiritual qi than the main island of the Five Elders Association sea domain, so they didn’t covet the spiritual qi here.

Therefore, their best choice was indeed to find an agent, seeking only to plunder resources without desiring political control.

Li Jizhou locked onto the Fake Pill Master, squinting slightly.

“Boom~” Suddenly, a loud bang erupted inside the array.

Li Jizhou turned his head to see that Master Shangshan, who had once observed from outside when the Core Formation was forming, had been seriously injured by a sharp onslaught from the killing array, with his magical artifact shattered and blood splattering everywhere.

“Master Han, what are you waiting for?” Qian Jianghan’s face darkened, threateningly.

“You!” Master Shangshan collapsed to the ground, heavily injured, landing in front of Master Han, making him extremely angry.

Moments ago, he merely made a request, hoping to be let out of the array first, and then he’d tell Qian Jianghan where the Profound Crystal Fruit Tree was, but the other side directly responded to him with action.

“Kill the Thief Qian first!” Just as everyone’s eyes were drawn to Qian Jianghan and Master Han, Jiang Li used divine sense to communicate with the other island lords, instantly reaching a consensus, and suddenly launched an assault on Qian Jianghan.

They believed that Qian Jianghan was the one controlling the life and death decisions of the array, so if they could subdue Qian Jianghan immediately, the crisis could be resolved.

“Bang! Bang! Bang!”

However, even before Qian Jianghan could react, Jiang Li and the others had already suffered attacks from the killing array.

They were instantly wounded by the killing array, falling to the ground.

Jiang Li was slightly better off, equipped with an ancestral quasi-third-tier treasure armor that only caused his blood to surge, sustaining minor injuries.

Yanzhen of Pearl Jade Island relied on a tier-three Fake Pill Demon Beast to shield himself at a critical moment, but the tier-three Fake Pill Demon Beast lost combat ability instantly.

The other individuals, however, were all severely injured and in critical condition.

This scene alone made those trapped within the killing array too scared to act rashly.

“Master Han…” Qian Jianghan looked back at Master Han again.

But before he could finish speaking,

suddenly, the killing array overhead began to shake violently.

Soon after, the entire main island started to quake intensely.

“What’s going on?” Qian Jianghan was gripped with anxiety, hurriedly transmitting messages to Liu Yuxiu outside.

Outside, the Second Elder of the Liu family, serving as the leader today, also had a drastic change in expression, hastily sending messages to the Liu family disciples stationed at each array base.

“Second Elder, there are demon beasts attacking my array base!”

“The same here, demon beasts are attacking!”

“Not just one, at least three tier-two demon beasts are shaking the array base!”

Almost instantly, similar messages came from all Liu family disciples guarding the array bases.

“What? Demon beasts attacking the array base? Are they mad?”

Liu Yuxiu was shocked.

Five years ago, after the Liu family completely controlled the cultivation world of the Chu Kingdom, they accidentally learned that there were countless mineral resources and array materials thousands of miles away in the sea domain, inspiring their interest to intervene.

However, due to the great distance and the large number of Foundation Establishment cultivators in the sea domain, they hesitated and could only honestly trade and purchase with them.

Until two years ago, Qian Jianghan of Qianhu Island, their long-term trading partner, secretly contacted them.

They ultimately established a cooperative agreement based on an annual fixed supply of resources.

To aid Qian Jianghan in unifying the sea domain, the Liu family nearly exhausted two-tenths of their family assets, taking two years to create this killing array.

Although it only took half a day to set up today, the preliminary preparations required too much time and effort.

Due to the large size of the array, the complexity of its base, and since Liu Yuxiu, a Fake Pill cultivator, personally managed the array hub, he never worried about issues with the array.

First, those unfamiliar with arrays couldn’t decipher the locations of the array bases.

Second, even if they discovered them, they couldn’t extract all the bases simultaneously.

However, at this moment, feeling the intense tremors of the killing array, he felt a pang of anxiety.

“How could so many demon beasts attack the array bases at once?”

“Boom~” Instantly, the array tremors intensified, causing the ground to shake mountains.

“Protect the array bases! Everyone, protect the array bases!” Liu Yuxiu jolted in surprise.

He hurriedly relayed commands to all Liu family disciples and the Qian family direct descendants appointed by Qian Jianghan.

Qian Jianghan, within the array, was filled with fear. All he relied on today was this killing array. If problems occurred with the array, he would inevitably face death.

“There are too many demon beasts, we can’t defend against them!”

“Second Elder, we’ve suffered heavy casualties.”

“We can’t hold on much longer!”

…

As the urgent voice transmission came from the person maintaining the protective array, looking at the faltering killing array, Liu Yuxiu gritted his teeth tightly.

His eyes shifted quickly for a moment, then he took a deep breath and secretly signaled all the Liu family disciples to retreat swiftly, boarding the spirit ship of Qianhu Island before the killing array shattered.

The situation was clear, there was a high-level presence here!

Not only did they see through the basis of the killing array and knew the way to break it, but crucially, they could also control so many Tier Two demon beasts at once.

Such a person, he was not their match, not even the entire Liu family was.

Originally, learning about the Profound Crystal Fruit today, they thought Heaven had given the Liu family a great opportunity, but now… they realized too late.

The waters of the Five Elders Association run deep, the Liu family shouldn’t have gotten involved.

A moment later, the Liu family silently vanished from near the killing array.

Meanwhile, within the killing array, it became increasingly unstable, the ground shook with murderous intent rampant, everyone was on edge fearing a sudden attack from the array.

Simultaneously, the commotion in the forbidden area underneath the core region of the main island didn’t draw the attention of those on the surface.

As three Breaking Charms were completely activated, the Tier Three restriction array outside the Profound Crystal Fruit tree shattered.

Li Jizhou, sharing the perspective, saw the small sapling half the height of a person.

A lustrous golden fruit appeared particularly enticing.

“Use your hundred-treasure pouch, put the soil under the sapling into it as well, be very careful not to dislodge the Profound Crystal Fruit,” Li Jizhou sternly instructed.

Gugu immediately dug up nearly a yard of soil beneath the sapling and carefully placed it into the hundred-treasure pouch together with the sapling.

Then quietly burrowed underground to hide, and sent a divine sense message to the buddies outside the array to work harder.

Waiting for the array to break, they could escape from here.

Li Jizhou sensed the Liu family gradually disappearing to the west, but in the end, he didn’t move an inch.

As the Liu family left, more array bases were removed.

“Crack~” With a crisp sound, a crack appeared on top of the killing array, seeing this, Master Han felt a surge of joy and disappeared from the spot in a flash.

The next moment,

“Boom~”

The killing array completely shattered.

“Kill!” Jiang Li immediately led the guards to attack Qian Jianghan, who looked bewildered.

Meanwhile, Li Jizhou wore a hint of delight on his face, silently climbing down from the coconut tree and returning to his courtyard.

Gazing at the intact Profound Crystal Fruit tree, smelling the enticing aroma of the maturing fruit, Li Jizhou was one step closer to the Golden Core.

“You’ve made a great contribution!” He patted Gugu’s head with gratification.

Then he took out the Jade Purification Bottle, which previously contained the Celestial Pure Water and transplanted the Profound Crystal Fruit tree into it.

By now, Li Jizhou had long understood the value of this Jade Purification Bottle that he obtained in a strange secret realm years ago.

This was a spatial treasure with a shielding divine sense function, even with his current divine sense, comparable to a Fake Pill Master, he couldn’t discern its depth.

After transplanting the Profound Crystal Fruit tree into it, Li Jizhou added a drop of Celestial Pure Water to it.

The Celestial Pure Water is not only a Core Formation spiritual object, its essence is Heaven and Earth Spirit Water, which greatly benefits all plants.

It can accelerate growth and enhance quality.

However, he only had half a bottle and dared not waste it.

“Which little thief stole my Han family’s Profound Crystal Fruit tree?” At that moment, an earth-shattering roar echoed across the entire sea domain.

Li Jizhou paused slightly, then smiled with ease.

A sudden glimmer passed through his eyes, and he returned to the coconut tree he had been on with Gugu, once again.

Looking from a distance at the situation on the main island.

Qian Jianghan was long decapitated, Qianhu Island’s followers scattered and fled.

Most of the Han family members on the main island prostrated themselves on the ground, choosing to surrender.

Two Fake Pill Masters were also severely injured and fell to the ground.

Only Master Han, just out of the forbidden area, was enraged beyond measure.

“Stop yelling false accusations and surrender!” Jiang Li commanded tens of thousands of close guards to attack the frenzied Master Han from a distance with magic.

Despite the overwhelming numbers, Master Han was, after all, a True Core Master, and his top-grade magical artifact was immensely powerful, causing hundreds of allied casualties with each attack.

However, Jiang Li commanded the allies to rotate in batches, continuously wearing him down.

Eventually, Master Han showed signs of exhaustion, his dantian’s magical power excessively depleted, leading to insufficient recovery. He took one last glance at the Han clan members, gave a long whistle, and flew into the air.

“Old thief, don’t think of leaving without leaving the Profound Crystal Fruit tree!” Suddenly, Yan Zhen, who had been idling, roared sternly.

A Tier Three Fake Pill Great Demon soared into the sky.

It turned out to be a three-headed giant snake that had never shown itself before.

One snakehead spewed crimson magma, blocking Master Han’s path, another snakehead spat a Water-Frozen Arrow straight at Master Han’s dantian, and the largest middle head opened its blood-red mouth to bite Master Han.

Facing the sudden attack of the fully vigorous Tier Three Great Demon in his exhausted state, Master Han’s face tightened.

Li Jizhou was slightly moved too, this three-headed snake, though having a Fake Pill as its demon pill, showcased the power of a mature Great Demon, clearly having solidified its pill for a long enough time, its magical power impressive.

To this, Li Jizhou was quite delighted.

He calmly stayed on the tree to watch the drama unfold.

Until after hundreds of rounds of fierce battle, the confrontation reached its end, the three-headed giant snake crashed to the ground.

One snakehead burst open, its life and death unknown.

Master Han, with one arm completely severed, looked utterly miserable, hastily piloting a beam of escape light towards the north.

Finally, Li Jizhou made his move…

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep