Soon, they arrived at the place where they had landed before. Zhao Jiuge was preparing to control his flying sword to blade soar when he heard a sound coming from the distance. This caught Zhao Jiuge’s attention, and when he looked up, his pupils shrank.

He saw four figures riding four Blood Movement Realm spirit cranes about to land on the peak. They were coming to the Duty Hall to accept missions.

The four spirit cranes flapped their wings and flew through the sky. The spirit cranes were completely white aside from the black on their heads and the red on their wing tips. The figure sitting on the first crane was a round youth—it was Wang Baiwan.

On the other crane sat Mu Zijun, who was still elegant and handsome. On the last two cranes sat the sweet and charming Liu Yinger and a gloomy youth.

Only the disciples from influential families could afford them Blood Movement Realm spirit cranes. Although the cranes were only at the Blood Movement Realm and were only good as mounts, they were not cheap.

These spirit cranes had been fed spirit herbs since they were born. Due to their nature, their strength increased a lot slower than humans, but their bodies were very strong.

Although this was the case, the amount of spirit beasts tamed by people was very small. Those too weak would be useless, while those powerful enough to turn human would not surrender so easily. There was a pitiful amount of cultivators who had powerful spirit beasts. Most merely had powerless spirit beasts that could only be used as mounts.

The main reason was that a spirit beast needed to cultivate for hundreds of years, while a human could not live that long unless their cultivation level continued to increase. Very few people would raise a spirit beast from the moment it was born. However, spirit beasts often existed in these long-lasting sects. These spirit beasts were trained by generations of disciples from the sect, and they lived for a long time. Not only were they loyal, but their strength would increase over time. Many of these sects had a guardian spirit beast.

Some of the powerful cultivators had spirit beasts following them. Some had directly surrendered, while others were raised by these cultivators with very long lives. When Zhao Jiuge and the youth with the scar battled, all those spirit beasts the inner disciples were riding had very little spirit force. They could only be used as mounts at most. Although the Hua Xia Dynasty contained countless mountains and forests filled with spirit beasts but any spirit beast that gained intelligence would resist being enslaved.

Aside from the gloomy youth the other three were all happily chatting about something. When the four cranes descended near the peak, they suddenly stopped talking. It was apparent that they had spotted Zhao Jiuge and Bai Qingqing at the peak.

In an instant, the four people on the spirit cranes all had different expressions. Wang Baiwan looked into the distance and acted like he hadn’t seen Zhao Jiuge. The gloomy-looking youth who had no expression before suddenly had a playful smile on his face. Mu Zijun’s handsome and elegant appearance disappeared, and his expression was a bit ugly. Only Liu Yinger looked excited and wanted to shout out toward Zhao Jiuge. However, when she saw Bai Qingqing next to him, her gaze became dim. She lowered her head and remained silent.

The frequency at which the spirit cranes flapped their wings decreased and they slowly descended to the ground. The four people got off the spirit cranes and ignored them while heading toward the Duty Hall. They seemed to be a group that had just come back from a mission. The four spirit cranes were very obedient and leisurely walked around—they were very clever. Zhao Jiuge felt envious looking at them.

Seeing these four, Zhao Jiuge felt a bit embarrassed. When he saw Wang Baiwan pretend not to see him, he was too lazy to take the initiative to say hello. However, he felt it strange that even Liu Yinger had pretended not to see him. However, when he thought about the situation between the two sides, he understood.

The four people arrived beside Zhao Jiuge and Bai Qingqing. Intentional or not, they all released their spirit force like they were showing off. Zhao Jiuge found that aside from Mu Zijun, who was at the Foundation Realm, the other three were all at the Spirit Transformation Realm.

When Mu Zijun and Zhao Jiuge walked past each other, he stared at Zhao Jiuge and snorted in disdain, perhaps due to the conflict they had before. All this arrogance came from the fact that he had reached the mid stage of the Foundation Realm inside the spirit vein not long ago. Right now, Zhao Jiuge had his aura withdrawn, so he thought Zhao Jiuge was still at the Spirit Transformation Realm.

Facing such naked provocation, Zhao Jiuge merely smiled and didn’t say a word. He didn’t care about Mu Zijun and was not afraid of him. Right now, Zhao Jiuge only wanted to earn sect contributions and enhance his strength. As for fighting, there would be plenty of opportunities in the future.

He had already walked past Zhao Jiuge, but turned his head to stare at him. Seeing Zhao Jiuge ignoring him, he secretly cursed Zhao Jiuge as useless trash and continued walking. Bai Qingqing was behind Zhao Jiuge, and now his gaze turned toward her. Mu Zijun always felt  dissatisfaction toward this woman, but he also dreaded her. Her stealing his thunder when they had just entered the sect and entering the spirit vein before him made him very unhappy, but she was strong enough that he had to be wary of her.

However, Bai Qingqing’s temper was not as good as Zhao Jiuge’s. When Mu Zijun stared at her for a few seconds, Bai Qingqing immediately shouted, “What are you looking at? Have you never seen a beauty before?”

After she spoke, not only did Mu Zijun become stunned, even Zhao Jiuge’s face twitched. He finally couldn’t hold it in and burst out laughing. Bai Qingqing immediately stared at him, and he no longer dared to keep laughing.

Mu Zijun recovered himself. He wanted to rebuke, but thinking about Bai Qingqing’s strength, he felt a sense of dread. He was afraid of saying something, but at the same time, it would shame himself if he didn’t. Mu Zijun opened his mouth but hesitated to speak.

“You’re still not convinced? If you’re not convinced, then come and have a fight with this old lady. This old lady has some anger I can’t vent.” Seeing My Zijun's expression, Bai Qingqing replied with her fury.

It was My Zijun's turn to become speechless, and he was a bit lost at what to do. A moment later, his expression became gloomy and he said, “Now is not the time, but the selection is only a little over a year away. At that time, we will settle all our scores, old and new.” After that, he led his group into the Duty Hall.

“Hmph, useless men.”

When Bai Qingqing said this, Mu Zijun’s expression became embarrassed, but he pretended not to hear and continued walking forward.

After he was a certain distance away, he viciously cursed, “You pair of dogs, wait for me to deal with you both in a year.”

When Liu Yinger heard this, her eyes dimmed once more. Thinking about some things, she knew that it was impossible for her and Zhao Jiuge to interact again. She completely gave up on the idea in her heart and buried an unknown emotion deep inside her.

A moment later, the youth that hadn’t said anything yet finally spoke. “This Zhao Jiuge is not simple. Next time, let me do something, my hands are itchy. I remember seeing the youth with the scar lose to him.” 

After hearing the youth’s words, Mu Zijun was shocked, but he still nodded.

Seeing the four of them leave, Bai Qingqing turned around to scold Zhao Jiuge, only to see him staring at the four spirit cranes. Seeing Zhao Jiuge’s envious expression and his eyes shining, Bai Qingqing’s temper finally erupted. “Zhao Jiuge, can you be less of a disgrace? What’s the point of having these garbage mounts that are only good for their looks? How about you aspire for something better?”

Zhao Jiuge replied without turning his head. “It is still a mount. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about running out of spirit force. Once I forge my flying sword, I’ll find a way to get one. How cool.”

“My own strength is the top priority, these things are just for show. Unless they are intelligent or powerful spirit beasts, they are all useless.” Bai Qingqing’s face was filled with disdain.

Although Zhao Jiuge agreed with Bai Qingqing’s words, he still envied them from the bottom of his heart. There were too many things that he wanted, but he had to struggle on his own to obtain them.

With a reluctant gaze, Zhao Jiuge opened his mouth and said, “Let's go, time is sect contributions.”

Bai Qingqing rolled her eyes and was too lazy to bother with him. She stepped onto her sword and flew off into the distance. In an instant, the distance between the two of them increased.

Zhao Jiuge quickly stepped onto his sword and followed. He sighed in his heart. 

“A woman’s heart is as deep as the ocean. We were fine just now, but after arriving at the Duty Hall, I have no idea what is up with her.”

Just like this, the two rays of sword light flew toward the edge of the Mysterious Heaven Mountain Range one after the other.

Along the way, Bai Qingqing didn’t have any intent of waiting for Zhao Jiuge. She rushed forward, while Zhao Jiuge was struggling to keep up. In order to not fall far behind, Zhao Jiuge injected spirit force into the sword like crazy, and because he was going too fast, the Blue Plum Sword was beginning to shake.

At this moment, Zhao Jiuge found that he was lacking spirit force. He regretted not listening to Bai Qingqing and recovering his spirit force first. He didn’t have much spirit force, but he didn’t dare to stop, because Bai Qingqing’s expression was still cold. He could only force out what little spirit force he had to chase after her.

After the two of them passed several more peaks, Zhao Jiuge’s spirit force was almost completely gone, and his sword was shaking violently. Perhaps because she noticed that something was wrong, Bai Qingqing looked back.

Seeing Bai Qingqing looking back at him, Zhao Jiuge couldn’t care about anything else anymore. He didn’t know which peak was below them, but he began to rapidly descend. If he didn’t land now, he was going to fall to his death due to the lack of spirit force.

Seeing Zhao Jiuge land in a panic, Bai Qingqing stopped rushing forward and turned 180 degrees to follow him down. At this point, she could not know that Zhao Jiuge had run out of spirit force.

He was still on his flying sword and hadn't landed when Bai Qingqing shouted, “Zhao Jiuge!” Due to her anger, there was a hint of red on her white and tender face.