At this moment, Chu Lingyue gave a cold laugh.
With just this laugh, the black hand that was about to reach in suddenly stiffened.
Then, Chu Lingyue, with her hand forming a seal, coldly pointed at the large black hand and said:
"Everything that is received, and continues, and ceases, is called 'shadowless'; it is called 'nirvana.'"
As soon as these words were spoken, a terrifying aura of destruction, like the sudden appearance of the stench of rotting corpses, surged toward the black hand like a wave with Chu Lingyue's proud gesture.
A silent explosion followed, and the giant black hand, enveloped in black mist, suddenly retracted, with sparks appearing on its fingers.
"Choose either nirvana or return to the demon realm."
Chu Lingyue's voice was as cold as ice.
The black hand, retracting its fingers, slowly clenched into a fist, as if hesitating.
At this moment, the originally silent world suddenly echoed with a dragon's roar, followed by an angry bellow from an old voice:
"What demon dares to offend my Qingxuan!"
With these words, the black hand, transformed from the heavenly demon, no longer hesitated, abruptly retracting from the window and disappearing as if it had never been there.
Thunder, wind, and rain suddenly returned to the world.
"The little black dragon guarding the entrance of Qingxuan Sect actually sensed this heavenly demon? I underestimated it, but it seems to have only sensed it, not truly discovered its existence."
Chu Lingyue, whose figure had become much more transparent, glanced in the direction of the entrance to Qingxuan Sect, then the corners of her mouth slightly lifted, and she turned to look at Xu Taiping, who was in a state of deep concentration, and continued to murmur:
"But today, I owe it to him. Without his roar, I would have had to use the Nirvana Fire Spell, and if that happened, I wouldn't be able to see the little guy for at least thirty years."
Although thirty years was just a moment for her, after spending this time with the little guy, she really didn't want to part with him.
"I originally planned to deal with the tiger demon together with the little guy, but now it seems I am powerless. If I don't return to the fruit of the earth to sleep, I fear..."
This wisp of residual soul would have problems. "Forget it, I'll leave a letter for the little guy, informing him of the Ice Breath Technique. With the Ice Breath Technique and his talent for comprehension, he will surely be able to deal with the tiger demon."
Chu Lingyue, while muttering softly, used her mental power to control a brush on the table, beginning to write on a piece of white paper.
This brush was one of the few things she could still use with her current residual soul.
"Sister will sleep for at least a month, or up to half a year. Take care, little Taiping. If you encounter anything interesting, remember it well, and when Sister awakens, tell her about it."
After writing the last line, Chu Lingyue's strength was completely exhausted, and she turned into a wisp of smoke, drifting out of the room and finally entering the withered branch of the fruit of the earth buried in the medicinal garden.
Xu Taiping finally used the Residual Dusk True Qi to break through the invisible barrier around his dantian.
He successfully broke through to the Opening Gate realm.
At the moment of breaking through to the Opening Gate realm, Xu Taiping gained the ability to see internally. With just a thought, he saw the "Qi Sea" after the dantian barrier was broken.
As if standing in a gray, hazy world, he could occasionally see several clumps of true qi floating around.
Even with this cursory glance, he could still intuitively feel the vast difference between the Qi Sea and the dantian.
"No wonder Daoist Ziyang said that, and no wonder the transmission jade slip said that only at the Opening Gate realm can one practice Daoist techniques. A small dantian simply cannot contain the true qi required to perform Daoist techniques."
Xu Taiping, filled with shock, sighed in his heart.
"Right, I need to tell Sister Lingyue this good news quickly."
He suddenly thought of the Immortal Lingyue who was still guarding by his bed, immediately gathered his thoughts, and opened his eyes.
What made Xu Taiping a bit puzzled was that Immortal Lingyue was not in the room, and the window was wide open, with a strange, unsettling aura permeating the room, as if something extremely dangerous had just been there.
Feeling increasingly uneasy, Xu Taiping rolled off the bed and shouted out the door.
Just as he was thinking about whether to go to the medicinal garden to look, his peripheral vision caught a letter on the table, held down by a paperweight.
He quickly went over and picked it up—
"Little Taiping, when you read this letter, Sister has already returned to the withered branch of the fruit of the earth to sleep. I leave this letter to inform you of a few things."
What met Xu Taiping's eyes was a very graceful and free-flowing script.
The writing was like the person, clearly left by Immortal Lingyue.
However, as Xu Taiping continued to read, the joy that had just surged from breaking through the realm quickly dissipated—
"When you broke through just now, you attracted a heavenly demon, which is likely related to your spiritual soul quality."
Xu Taiping had never thought that such an existence, which he had only read about in the Qingxuan Sect's records, would appear by his side.
Xu Taiping finally finished reading the letter.
Although there were still many things he did not fully understand, such as "Tongming Daoxin" and "heavenly demon," he understood why Sister Lingyue had suddenly fallen asleep again—
"At the moment I thought I had successfully broken through, Sister Lingyue was risking her life to help me drive away the heavenly demon."
Thinking of this, he put away the unfolded letter, and the joy and surprise in his eyes faded like a tide.
He closed the window, carefully placed the letter in the wooden box given to him by his grandfather, and then sat back on the bed, beginning to meditate without a word.
The scenes of the night made the young Xu Taiping,
get a glimpse of the dangers of the cultivation path.
"If it weren't for Sister Lingyue, even if I had broken through to the Opening Gate realm tonight, I would have been devoured by the heavenly demon. The road ahead is long, and I cannot always rely on Sister Lingyue. Since I now have the qualifications to cultivate, I must work a hundred times harder and strive a hundred times more, so that this mortal body can also ascend to the heavens! If the obstacle is the demon tiger, I will kill the demon tiger; if the obstacle is the heavenly demon, I will slay the heavenly demon!"
Xu Taiping silently made up his mind in his heart.
In fact, perhaps even Immortal Lingyue couldn't see that Xu Taiping's greatest reliance on the cultivation path was not some "Tongming Daoxin," but the resilient will he had honed since childhood under his grandfather's guidance.
In the Qingfeng Gorge, inside the tiger demon's cave.
The tiger demon stood at the peak of the gorge, letting out a powerful roar. The force of the sound waves spread out like ripples on the water, scaring the fierce beasts in the mountains to cower on the ground.
"My wounds are almost healed. In another month, I will be fully recovered!"
The tiger demon laughed viciously, then touched the long scar on his face, and with a fierce look, gazed at the red maple forest outside the cave:
"Mo Jun of the Fifth Peak, you want me to be your mount? You don't deserve it! When I am healed, if you dare to come to Qingfeng Gorge again, I will make you taste the secret treasure of the Shuofeng Tiger clan, the Cloud Devouring Pearl."
As he spoke, he suddenly reached into his mouth and pulled out a silver-white pearl.
The moment the Cloud Devouring Pearl appeared, a fierce wind suddenly swept through the red maple forest outside the cave, cutting many trees in half.
Looking at the scene of the raging wind outside the cave, the tiger demon swallowed the Cloud Devouring Pearl with satisfaction, then reined in his smile, turned his gaze to the direction of the Green Bamboo Residence, and said coldly:
"And you, little brat of the Green Bamboo Residence, you dare to harm my ghost? I will turn you into a ghost and make you suffer under my torment for all eternity!"