Two months before the recruitment of new disciples, Gu Ningyun and Wen Xuan completed their preparations, visited the New Disciple Training Department, and passed the teaching assessment for simulated courses.
With that, the most crucial and pressing part of their preparation work as guides was finally complete.
Just as the two breathed a sigh of relief and were about to check on the progress of Mu Chenze and the other two to see if they could resume learning the Four-Person Array with the Demon-Purifying Square Seals...
...Gu Ningyun and Wen Xuan's Deacon Jade Tablets grew hot simultaneously, flashing with a bright red light.
This was a distress signal indicating an emergency in a large-scale pavilion mission, which allowed deacons to report directly to the Pavilion Master, bypassing intermediate channels.
Their eyes narrowed as they scanned the message:
【In the depths of the Gold-Scale Sand Mine within the Liujin Mountains of Yunzhou, we encountered a swarm of Gold-Sand Ants. Three hundred disciples are trapped, and six deacons are severely injured. Requesting immediate backup!
—Tang Mengyu, Deacon of Zhiwei Abode, Songyue Pavilion】
The Gold-Scale Sand mining mission was a joint assignment between Songyue Pavilion and Daigu Pavilion.
Each pavilion dispatched two hundred handyman disciples to mine the ore vein, along with three deacon disciples responsible for recording output quantities, maintaining order, and handling transport.
The two sides worked together while supervising each other.
For an accident to occur during a large-scale mission and require the intervention of the Pavilion Masters was quite normal.
However, having most of the disciples trapped and four deacons at Qi Refining level twelve injured was rare.
Could they have run into a massive swarm of Gold-Sand Ants?
Gu Ningyun and Wen Xuan immediately sent a message to Daigu Pavilion, who had indeed received the distress signal as well.
Without wasting a moment, the four of them went straight to Wuxin City and took the teleportation array to the city closest to the Liujin Mountains.
From there, they took to the air using object-kinesis and flew straight toward the Liujin Mountains.
The Head Pavilion Master of Daigu Pavilion was a senior sister at the mid Foundation Establishment stage named Wu Wen.
The Deputy Pavilion Master was a senior brother at the mid Foundation Establishment stage named Meng Junxi.
Although both were inner sect disciples, they had both risen from the ranks of handyman disciples.
Hearing that the handyman disciples under their command were trapped, they were exceptionally anxious.
Wu Wen flew over on a Rock-Splitting Cone and called out, "Junior sisters, since you both broke through to Foundation Establishment only recently, why don't Junior Brother Meng and I carry you to save time?"
Meng Junxi stepped toward the front of his Mountain-Shaking Axe, leaving space behind him.
Hearing this, Gu Ningyun shook her head. "Senior Sister, Senior Brother, please fly at your full speed. Wen Xuan and I can keep up."
At these words, Wu Wen frowned slightly.
Meng Junxi grew even sterner, his voice dropping coldly. "Junior Sister, do not force yourself. We cannot afford to delay such an urgent matter."
"There will be a tough battle ahead. Carrying us would only consume your spirit energy for no good reason."
Wen Xuan felt a bit helpless. "We aren't forcing ourselves, Senior Brother."
Were it not impolite, she would have loved to accelerate right past them and leave the two behind, just so they could see for themselves whether she and Ningyun could keep up.
Seeing the two insist on flying on their own, Wu Wen and Meng Junxi felt a chill in their hearts.
Junior Sister Gu and Junior Sister Wen were formal disciples who had never left the sect's protection since childhood; how could they possibly comprehend the despair of trapped handyman disciples?
Unable to even empathize, how could they feel for them or give their all to save them?
Just to save face, they insisted on pushing themselves and wasting precious time.
The two probably came merely to fulfill their duties as Pavilion Masters.
Wu Wen let out a long sigh. Oh well, she and Junior Brother Meng would take the lead.
She could only hope the situation over there was not too dire, and that she and Junior Brother Meng alone would be enough to resolve it.
At this thought, Wu Wen took the lead in casting her spell, leaning forward as she pushed her speed to its limit.
Meng Junxi followed closely behind.
Gu Ningyun stepped onto her peach wood sword, her speed not trailing in the slightest.
Wen Xuan slapped a Swift-Walk Talisman onto herself and flew beside Gu Ningyun, standing atop her mace.
After flying for a while, Wu Wen and Meng Junxi caught sight of the two out of the corners of their eyes, astonished to find them following right behind without lagging back half a step.
Filled with shock and disbelief, both turned back sharply to look at them.
There stood the two youths—one riding a sword, the other standing on a mace.
The one on the sword had rosy cheeks and an easy composure, her sleeves fluttering gracefully as if she were riding the wind itself.
Far from showing any sign of strain, she even had the leisure to form a wind screen to block the oncoming gale.
The one riding the mace looked calm and composed, her feet planted like nails on the handle of the weapon; let the gale howl as it might, she stood as immovable as Mount Tai.
A rustling sound of paper friction mingled in the wind. Meng Junxi glanced over at the sound, his eyes instantly turning complex.
That was no ordinary paper—it was clearly a stack of talismans, specifically mysterious-rank low-grade Swift-Walk Talismans worth two mid-grade spirit stones apiece.
Swift-Walk Talismans were rarer and pricier than other talismans. Just how extravagant did one have to be to use Swift-Walk Talismans just to travel?!
He had spent over thirty years in the inner sect and seen countless inner sect disciples—why was Junior Sister Wen so uniquely lavish?!
Did Junior Sister Wen own a mine at home?
She was holding such a thick stack too—what if her grip slipped and the wind blew them away?
For a distance like this, five at most would have been more than enough.
Feeling his burning gaze, Wen Xuan looked at the talismans in her hand and then back at the source of the look, a hint of confusion in her eyes.
Why was Senior Brother Meng staring at her talismans?
This stack of talismans had been given to her by Ningyun shortly after her breakthrough to Foundation Establishment. Ningyun had said they were practice works, somewhat flawed, and that she wasn't particularly satisfied with them.
She had told her to just use them whenever.
Half a month later, Ningyun had given her another hundred flawless ones, telling her to save those for fighting enemies outside.
Senior Brother Meng's gaze...
Could it be that he couldn't fly any faster and wanted a couple from her?
That wouldn't do; Ningyun's stack was really not very stable. One of them had even exploded when she used it a few days ago.
Only a body cultivator like her could withstand it, losing merely half a strand of hair.
Senior Brother Meng looked soft and delicate at first glance, so better not.
Wen Xuan stored most of the talismans back into her storage ring.
Seeing Wen Xuan stash away the talismans, Meng Junxi inexplicably breathed a sigh of relief.
No need to worry about them blowing away in the wind now.
Wu Wen had naturally seen the talismans in Wen Xuan's hand as well.
Unlike that blockhead Meng Junxi, she was strategic and often paid attention to news from the outer peaks.
With a single glance, she guessed that this stack of talismans had undoubtedly been crafted by Junior Sister Gu.
Though she had long heard of her, seeing was indeed believing.
A top-grade wind spirit root, rare even in hundreds of years, and a high-grade fire spirit root who refused Alchemy Peak to practice body refining—neither of them was ordinary.
She had underestimated them.
Wu Wen exhaled, her expression softening slightly.
Her confidence in this trip also increased.
Having thought it through, Wu Wen withdrew her gaze.
Naturally, she had also noticed Meng Junxi's reaction.
That blockhead drooling over the talismans was truly embarrassing to the extreme; how did she end up with such a foolish partner?
Wu Wen couldn't be bothered to pay attention to Meng Junxi, nor did she feel like explaining the source of the talismans to him, so she focused her mind entirely on figuring out how to rescue the disciples trapped in the mine shaft.
Upon arriving at the Liujin Mountains, none of the four had any mind left for other thoughts.
Not far from the entrance of the Gold-Scale Sand Mine shaft, several disciples stood with every muscle tense, their eyes glued to the entrance—evidently on guard.
A bit further away, even more disciples sat on the ground drenched in blood, bandaging each other's wounds.
Seeing the four arrive by object-kinesis, the dull, oppressive atmosphere in the mountains instantly sprang to life.
A slightly less injured disciple cheered, "It's the Pavilion Masters! They've come to save us!"
Rate on N.U.
