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Chapter 221: Crippling the Refinement Technique

Translator: Minotauruz

The Du Clan had been unable to fully refine the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf, but this did not prevent them from leaving a powerful Confusion Hex on its body. This Confusion Hex was cast by an elder of the Du Clan at the secondary-tier Void Formation stage of cultivation.[1] Before the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf attains the Void Formation stage of cultivation, the odds of it being able to shirk off the effects of this Confusion Hex was practically zero.

Under the effects of this Confusion Hex, the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf would view the Du Clan’s enemies as its greatest enemies – members of the Du Clan.

Furthermore, the fact that the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf had undergone the tormenting process of refinement three times meant that its bloodthirstiness was already at its peak, and its offensive abilities had also increased by several folds.

In other words, it would draw blood as soon as it made an appearance.

Jun Xiaomo’s appearances had already transformed under the effects of the Confusion Hex. The person that the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf hated the most was naturally the old fogey that had attempted to refine it three times, and right now, Jun Xiaomo appeared to the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf as none other than that same old fogey.

I’m going to kill that man!

An intense hatred flashed across the depths of its eyes, and the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s fur burgeoned once more as though it were congealing a corporeal manifestation of its killing intent. Then, within the next moment, the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf sent the massive fireball shooting straight towards Jun Xiaomo and engulfing her body in its entirety.

“Martial sister!”

“Xiaomo!”

“Martial sister!”

Several cries rang out from the surroundings. Jun Xiaomo lashed out with the whip in her hand and faced the fireball head on. With one lash of the whip, the entire fireball dissipated into the surroundings.

Jun Xiaomo possessed a fire-based spiritual root, and she naturally possessed a certain level of resistance against fire-based attacks.

Roar! The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf noticed that its first strike had failed, and it immediately leapt forward and lunged towards Jun Xiaomo’s back. Its claws looked menacing and incredibly sharp, as though one single slash with its claws would cleanly and effortlessly cleave Jun Xiaomo into two halves.

The other disciples in the Heavenly Peak faction immediately rushed over to Jun Xiaomo’s side as they attempted to share some of Jun Xiaomo’s burdens. However, the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was completely fixated on Jun Xiaomo, and it completely ignored all the other disciples. Fortunately, Jun Xiaomo possessed a wealth of combat experience, had the aid of her talismans and even possessed a unique approach to battle. If not for the confluence of all these factors, she might well have become minced meat under the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s relentless attacks.

In the audience booth, Rong Ruihan’s eyes instantly furrowed as he watched the battle unfold. His fists were tightly clenched together.

Rong Ruihan’s eyes grew darker and darker as time went by – every time another injury or wound appeared on Jun Xiaomo’s body, his eyes would darken by one shade.

There was still approximately half a day’s worth of time until the end of these group battles. Jun Xiaomo was evidently not a match for the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf. Rong Ruihan knew that things could not go on like this.

Thus, after deliberating for a moment, Rong Ruihan retrieved a talisman from his Interspatial Ring and discreetly applied it onto his palm.

As soon as the talisman hit the palm of his hand, it became a faint yet complex formation diagram. Rong Ruihan closed his eyes and made some hand seals. Moments later, the complex formation diagram activated!

In the marshlands, Jun Xiaomo was presently avoiding the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s relentless attacks when she suddenly felt a wave of warmth emanate from her earlobes.

This warmth was just like that of spring waters that flowed beside a volcano – even though the temperature was slightly on the warmer side, it was not something that would scald a person.

This is...

Jun Xiaomo got slightly distracted from the strange sensation she was experiencing. Yet it was precisely this moment of distraction that caused her to become fully exposed and susceptible to the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf oncoming attack.

“Xiaomo!”

“Martial sister!”

The audience watched in horror as the scene unfolded in front of their very eyes – the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf raised his enormous claws that were as large as a human was tall. A dreadful fireball had congealed on the tip of its claws right now. Then, the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf swiped straight at Jun Xiaomo’s head.

The fireball was so intensely hot that its flames had already become white in colour – the heat was so intense that it could melt steel and copper alike, much less the pure flesh and blood that constituted Jun Xiaomo’s body!

Several members of the audience felt that this was the end of Jun Xiaomo as they knew it.

He Zhang’s face revealed an expectant gaze; while a victorious smile crept up the corner of Dai Yanfeng’s lips. On the other hand, Jun Linxuan and Liu Qingmei subconsciously stood up as their worry and concern for their daughter reached their boiling point. This was especially the case for Jun Linxuan, whose face had turned a sickly green as he furiously fought against the urge to rush into the marshlands to rescue his daughter.

Tension filled the air among all the audience members alike, regardless of whether they worried for Jun Xiaomo, or whether they delighted in her predicament.

However, things did not pan out quite as how everyone expected it to. As soon as the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s claws swung down towards Jun Xiaomo, a ray of intense, focused light suddenly shot out from Jun Xiaomo’s body and pierced the heart of the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s paw.

The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf let out a yowl in pain as it reflexively shifted its enormous paw away and staggered two steps backwards.

This...what just happened? Why would there be a ray of light shooting out of Jun Xiaomo’s body?

Everyone turned their attention to where Jun Xiaomo was right now –

Jun Xiaomo’s body was once again visible as soon as the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf shifted its paw away. However, apart from presenting herself in a rather sorry state, there was nothing too vastly different between how she looked right now and how she was a few moments ago.

Jun Xiaomo had initially raised her whip to her head and braced herself to receive the impact from the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s powerful swipe at her. She did not want to perish here. Yet the unexpected happened – nothing happened to her; and it was the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf that suffered some injuries instead.

A trace of bewilderment revealed itself on Jun Xiaomo’s expressions.

However, she very quickly collected her emotions and refocused her mind on the present situation at hand.

She had earlier given the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf a prime opportunity to attack her precisely because she got distracted. There was no way she was going to give the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf another opportunity like that again.

If she did, she would most certainly lose her life.

As she refocused her mind on her current battle at hand, she completely shelved the earlier wave of heat that emanated from her earlobe. Outside the marshlands, Rong Ruihan opened his eyes and coughed into his fist. A dribble of blood seeped out of the corner of his lips.

Rong Ruihan discreetly wiped off this trace of blood, before quickly turning his attention back onto Jun Xiaomo as she faced off against the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf.

The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf yowled madly. At this moment, its eyes were filled with a destructive bloodlust as though it wanted to destroy everything within sight. Just like that, it began to thrash about with wanton disregard to its surroundings.

“Young master, what do we do? The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf looks like it’s getting out of control!” A Du Clan disciple just beside Du Yongxu cried out with dismay.

If the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf had indeed lost its senses, the ones who had the greatest cause for concern would naturally be these Du Clan disciples who laid defenceless where they were with their completely numbed bodies.

It did not matter that the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was not actively directing its attacks towards the Du Clan’s disciples right now. Given how the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was behaving right now, the Du Clan disciples knew that they might very well be seriously injured or even killed if the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf were to even inadvertently trample on their bodies.

Du Yongxu was incredibly exasperated. If they could just maintain their control over the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf, they would never be in such danger.

But the fact that the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf were thrashing about with reckless abandon certainly did not bode well for them.

Du Yongxu’s heart grew sullen. Then, he began to make a few more hand seals and murmur an inaudible mnemonic with his lips as he glared coldly at the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf.

At this moment, Du Yongxu was mustering the spiritual energy from every inch of his body and sending it straight into the formation array on his palm as he did all he could to subdue and control the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s actions.

The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was already in immense pain as a result of the hole in its paw caused by the focused and penetrating beam of light from Jun Xiaomo’s body earlier. Right now, Du Yongxu’s actions had undoubtedly caused it even more pain, as though Du Yongxu had just rubbed salt into its wounds. At this moment, the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf felt as though his entire body and mind were being torn apart to pieces.

The Du Clan’s method of controlling the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was an ancient Confusion Hex that had been handed down to them by their ancestors. Furthermore, an added function of the Confusion Hex was also to harm to the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s soul. Thus, it was practically impossible for the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf to attain the secondary-tier Void Formation stage of cultivation to dispel the hex on its body.

Once its soul has been damaged, its cultivation path was naturally also substantially truncated.

It was for this reason that most spirit beasts that had been refined could never wrest control of their lives back, and they were bound to spend the rest of their lives in servitude.

The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf yowled in fury. It had the primal urge to smash to smithereens every single person that had caused it such bitter and excruciating pain. However, it was unable to do so – its head hurt so much that it felt as though it were splitting in half. Its head hurt so much that it wanted to dig out its own brains to relieve itself of the splitting pain.

When the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf clutched helplessly at its enormous head, Jun Xiaomo immediately realised that something was wrong.

The Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s front paw was the one that had been injured by the penetrating light from Jun Xiaomo’s body. Logically speaking, there was no reason for it to be clutching painfully at its own head. Furthermore, it was evident that the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf was experiencing an excruciating pain of sorts right now.

Jun Xiaomo furrowed her brows. A fleeting notion flashed quickly across her mind, but Jun Xiaomo failed to latch onto it.

“Martial sister...why do I get the feeling that this spirit beast is experiencing excruciating pain right now? Furthermore, its movements look like it’s being restrained by something or someone. It’s practically moving like a puppet.” Wei Gaolang mulled aloud as he observed the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s actions.

Being restrained by something?! Jun Xiaomo’s heart thumped wildly – she finally knew what that earlier fleeting notion had been.

Back then, her little packrat had similarly nearly been refined by Situ Cang. At that time, it had also experienced an excruciating pain.

“Martial brothers, and friends from the Dragontiger Sect and the Purple Hut Sect, could I ask you to take a few steps back? I think I might have a way to deal with it.” Jun Xiaomo spoke in all earnestness to those around her.

“Mar-...martial sister, do you intend to deal with this vicious spirit beast alone?!” Wei Gaolang exclaimed in astonishment.

“That’s right. I’d like you all to take a few steps back. I should have a way to deal with it.”

The disciples of the Heavenly Peak faction were all incredibly worried for Jun Xiaomo’s safety, but they also noticed how sincere Jun Xiaomo was right now, so they naturally refrained from dissuading her any further.

Thus, everyone gave Jun Xiaomo a huge berth of space to do what she needed to do. Then, they trained their eyes on Jun Xiaomo and watched her closely. They readied themselves and mustered their energy so that as soon as Jun Xiaomo appeared to be in the slightest of danger, they would be able to dive right in and assist her once more.

Jun Xiaomo looked straight at the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf that was writhing in immense pain. A wave of compassion washed over her, while hatred and animosity filled her eyes against those who would resort to such inhumane practices to refine a majestic creature like the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf.

“Perhaps a creature that had been refined like you might not know this, but there’s a way to break such refinement techniques.” Jun Xiaomo called out to the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf as she prepared five talismans from her Interspatial Ring.

These talismans were used for the purposes of controlling spirit beasts or demonic creatures. Jun Xiaomo had read about these things in the Beast-Taming Technique that she had obtained earlier, and she knew some of the basics of taming spirit beasts.

Beast-taming techniques and refinement techniques were quite vastly different from each other. One of the primary differences was that beast-taming techniques never sought to harm the spirit beasts or demonic creatures that were being tamed.

Most importantly, there was a certainty that the usage of these beast-taming techniques would override and cripple the effects of the refinement technique on the spirit beast or demonic creature.

Jun Xiaomo watched for an opening. As soon as she found the best opportunity to do so, she dashed towards the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf and rushed straight towards its palm.

Then, she slapped the talisman straight onto the Scarlet Heavenly Wolf’s palm.

An intense blue light flashed –

Pfft! At the Du Clan’s residence, an elder of the Du Clan spat out a huge mouthful of blood and collapsed onto the ground.

1. Void formation is the sixth level of nine levels of cultivation.