Official Liu smacked Yun Jiuge with his large tail.

Yun Jiuge rolled away quickly and evaded his attack. When she stood up, she discovered that the corpse of a small monster was clinging to her sleeve.

Her eyes brightened instantly. She thought, “That's right! His weak point is at the back of his head.”

These three monsters were of the same species, so they must have had the same weakness.

Yun Jiuge flew up and made a hand gesture with both of her hands to direct the Wicked Blades to attack the back of Official Liu's head.

Official Liu wrapped his tail around the back of his head tightly in defense right away.

In what seemed like a dangerous move, Yun Jiuge tried to attract Official Liu's attention by darting around the underground chamber. After that, she willed one of the Wicked Blades to turn invisible and fly towards Official Liu. Once she saw the opportunity to attack, she commanded it to impale the back of his head.

Official Liu howled. He wanted to force the Wicked Blade out of his body but ended up activating the Wicked Blade's Spirit Absorption Technique instead.

The four remaining Wicked Blades took the chance to wound Official Liu further. They rammed the main Wicked Blade on the back of Official Liu's head one after another and then combined themselves into a long blood red Wicked Blade. After that, the Wicked Blade sliced Official Liu's head off.

Official Liu's body fell to the ground with a thump and transformed into a monster with a human face and a crocodile body.

Seven souls flew out of his body in succession. They were the seven wives that were killed by the monster.

Yun Jiuge was about to step forward to inspect the monster's corpse when it suddenly glowed blue. A soul with the appearance of a beautiful woman floated out of its body.

This soul emanated Spiritual Light. She was a Cultivator who was in the Middle Foundation Establishment Stage.

“Thank you very much, my friend. You destroyed this monster and rescued me.” The female Cultivator bowed to Yun Jiuge gratefully.

“May I know your name? How did this monster devour you?” Yun Jiuge felt that she could obtain some information from this female Cultivator.

“My name is Wen Hui. I am one of the Cultivators that came to these Ruins to strengthen myself,” said the female Cultivator.

As it turned out, these Ruins would appear every 8 years at different locations. However, one thing that remained constant was the vast amount of Cultivators' blood and souls required for the Ruins' doors to open. The Cultivators who eventually entered the Ruins were Foundation Establishment Stage ones.

Every Cultivator that entered the Ruins would get caught up in an illusion.

If they murdered the people in the illusion in a cruel and reckless manner, an extremely powerful monster would appear. The more people the Cultivators killed, the stronger the monster would become.

At that time, Wen Hui entered the Ruins with a Swordsman.

That Swordsman was an extremely rash man. When he found out that they were in an illusion, he killed everyone in the illusion so that they could break away from the illusion. In the end, this powerful Humanoid Crocodile Monster came after them.

After the Humanoid Crocodile Monster ripped the Swordsman into pieces with its teeth and gobbled him up, it raped Wen Hui.

After Wen Hui gave birth to two small Humanoid Crocodile Monsters, the large Humanoid Crocodile Monster ate her soul. The smaller Humanoid Crocodile Monsters then stuffed their faces with her body.

“Since you've killed the Humanoid Crocodile Monster, you can now extract the first entry pa.s.s for these Ruins from its brains.” Wen Hui instructed Yun Jiuge to pry open the Humanoid Crocodile Monster's head. Yun Jiuge did as she was told and found a black Internal Elixir which was the entry pa.s.s she needed.

“It seems that helping people in the illusion with their problems is a right decision.” Yun Jiuge held the Internal Elixir and looked at Zi Shang smugly. She was pleased that she could prove him wrong about her supposedly silly decision.

Zi Shang responded to Yun Jiuge with an apologetic gaze, as if he was saying, “Alright, alright, alright. You're the best.”

“My friend, I wish to request your help for another matter.” Wen Hui looked at Yun Jiuge pleadingly.

“Go ahead.” Yun Jiuge said.

“I would like to ask for your help to take this golden embroidery needle with cloud engraving to my home in Dongyun Kingdom and pa.s.s it to the Wen Clan. In return, I will reward you with the Wen Clan's secret Rune Inscription Technique which has been pa.s.sed down from generation to generation.” Wen Hui plucked a gold-plated embroidery needle with a white base from the back of the Humanoid Crocodile Monster's head.

If she had not sacrificed herself at that time to plunge this golden embroidery needle with cloud engraving into the back of the Humanoid Crocodile Monster's head, Yun Jiuge would have needed more effort to take the Humanoid Crocodile Monster down.

“Sure.” Yun Jiuge took the embroidery needle from Wen Hui.

This excellent Rank Four Magical Tool was a rare treasure. However, it was not valuable enough for her to falter on her promise to bring it to the Wen Clan.

“Thank you very much.” Wen Hui smiled slightly. After she threw a ball of light at Yun Jiuge, her soul vanished without a trace.

Yun Jiuge gained the knowledge of Rune Embroidery in her mind.

Although the techniques that Wen Hui gave her were not of a high level of skill, they still provided a lot of information about the basics of Rune Embroidery. It was very suitable for an amateur like Yun Jiuge.

“You can help sew some Runes on my clothes when you become more proficient at this.” Zi Shang was extremely supportive of Yun Jiuge's mastery of this technique.

“No problem, leave it to me.” Yun Jiuge felt that Zi Shang had entrusted her with an important task.

“Ahh! Monster! Monster!” At this time, He Hua, who was lying at a corner, screamed in terror as soon as she opened her eyes.

Earlier on Zi Shang had conjured a Protective Barrier to s.h.i.+eld her from the fight.

“Everything is alright now. I killed the monster.” Yun Jiuge recounted everything that had happened in the underground chamber, and summoned the souls of the Humanoid Crocodile's past wives to meet He Hua.

When He Hua saw them, she was so shocked that she fainted right away.

Yun Jiuge scratched her head awkwardly. She seemed to have fouled things up.

In the end, Zi Shang sealed this part of He Hua's memory away and brought her home with Yun Jiuge.

After that, Yun Jiuge went to the water source of the creek and poured some Antidote Pills into the water.

The Humanoid Crocodile Monster had contaminated the water source. Those who drank water from the creek would be bewitched into letting him drink their blood without any protest.

If she did not neutralize the poison in the creek, their health would deteriorate so badly that they would die before long.

Yun Jiuge did all that she could. After she ensured that the townsfolk stopped experiencing the negative effects of the poison, she decided to leave the town.

She never expected the Humanoid Crocodile Monster's black Internal Elixir to fly up to the sky once she stepped out of the town's perimeter. After a flash of light blinded her, the illusion disappeared completely. A large Labyrinth appeared before her eyes.

“I wonder if the owner of the Palace Ruins created this illusion to find an altruistic person.” Yun Jiuge's mind was full of questions.

Truth be told, if she was not trapped in this cursed place, she would not have devoted her time nor energy to care about the people in the illusion.

“People who show kindness to others are usually taken advantage of. The owner probably wanted to reward people who act compa.s.sionately. After all, those who choose to act the way you did are usually people with a low level of Cultivation.” Zi Shang's words really hit the nail on the head.

“That's true!” Yun Jiuge concurred.

The reason why she spent such a long time on the illusion was that her cultivation level was too low. She could not use blunt force but instead a safer method that would give her a higher chance of success.

Zi Shang and Yun Jiuge continued walking for another hour before reaching the entrance of the Labyrinth.

The entrance of the Labyrinth was an arch that was three yards in height. A large, handsome devil perched on top of the arch.

This devil had ram horns with curly, black hair.

Its slit eyes were completely black in color, while its lips were tightly pursed. It had an extremely stoic expression. Both of its arms were covered in black scales. They were wrapped around the arch, as if inviting Yun Jiuge to walk into its embrace.

This devil looked familiar to Yun Jiuge. She felt that she had seen it somewhere in the past and started racking her brains to figure it out.

“Enjoying the view?” Zi Shang's voice rang beside Yun Jiuge's ears, startling her.

“It's just a statue. What's there to see?” Yun Jiuge rolled her eyes at Zi Shang. She could not understand why Zi Shang implied that she was the type to be infatuated with any handsome man she met.

“Use your consciousness to scan our surroundings to see what lies ahead of us.” When Zi Shang saw that Yun Jiuge really thought nothing of the statue, his jealousy dissipated immediately.

“Oh.” Yun Jiuge a.s.sessed the area with her consciousness obligingly. After she was certain that it was safe for them to walk in, they did so vigilantly.

Zi Shang walked behind her. Right before he took a step into the Labyrinth, he lifted his head suddenly.

The eyes of the devil statue flashed red as it stared at Yun Jiuge l.u.s.tfully. Its lips were curved into a wicked smile.

Zi Shang's eyes glinted dangerously. He moved his finger and shot two rays of purple light towards the devil statue's eyes.

The devil statue's eyes lost their s.h.i.+ne. It pursed its lips tightly again, regaining its aloof expression.