Great Demon Sun Wukong

The City of Ruins was indeed a place of extreme danger. Even the mighty Lin Xi, Yao Wumeng, and Six-Eared Macaque barely survived entering its periphery, facing a deadly battle right from the start. Among the three factions, Bi Hai and Jixin—having arrived at the South City Gate first and entered the City of Ruins—also encountered danger the earliest. However, neither of them was a weakling.

Despite being in quite a disarray, and with Bi Hai even suffering backlash in the end to save Jixin, they were not seriously harmed.

Time rewound to the moment the two encountered that enormous Black Mirror Scorpion. Just as Jixin killed the fifteen-meter-long scorpion and was about to collect the Mysterious Crystal, he suddenly realized there was another colossal scorpion, over fifty meters in length.

Though Jixin fought desperately to reach Bi Hai's Barrier, he was a bit slower than the giant monster and had not yet entered the Barrier when three venom-laden Scorpion Tail Needles struck him in the back.

It was precisely the force of that sting that allowed Jixin to tumble into Bi Hai's Barrier, narrowly escaping with his life. Jixin had thought death was certain when he rolled into the Barrier, yet he found, to his surprise, that although his back ached terribly, he seemed to be neither poisoned nor bleeding.

By then, Jixin realized it must have been Bi Hai using Spatial Evasion forcefully at the last moment. As he passed through the Barrier, Jixin also saw two trails of blood tears flowing from Bi Hai's eyes, suggesting the backlash was caused by the consecutive use of Spatial Evasion. Before Jixin could utter words of thanks, he suddenly saw Bi Hai collapse rigidly backwards.

Hurrying to turn around and catch Bi Hai, Jixin found that Bi Hai had fainted and his breathing was greatly disordered. But then, Jixin witnessed something even more terrifying. As Bi Hai fell unconscious, the three-layer Barrier began to fluctuate and eventually disappeared. Without Bi Hai's Barrier to protect them from the monstrous super scorpion, they were as good as dead.

Staring at the fifty-meter-tall behemoth, Jixin's throat turned dry. Although he was a Body Cultivation practitioner and had transformed most of his purple runes into high-level light red ones, it didn't mean Jixin was willing or confident he could withstand a strike from the giant Black Mirror Scorpion.

Of course, if the scorpion wasn't venomous, Jixin might have had some confidence, but the sight of the changing colors of the venom on its tail made it likely that a single touch meant certain death.

But at this moment, with Bi Hai passed out and the Barrier gone, the Black Mirror Scorpion on the prowl, Jixin knew the scorpion was also waiting for its chance. Any slight movement, any small opening from him, would likely be met with a lethal attack from the scorpion. Its size clearly indicated intelligence not inferior to humans.

Otherwise, it wouldn't have stayed hidden, allowing the twenty-meter scorpion to act as bait, waiting for Jixin to slip up before striking.

Slowly lifting Bi Hai onto his back, Jixin's forehead was covered in cold sweat. The feeling of being watched was truly unbearable, especially by a creature so massive yet capable of instantaneously dispatching him to death, keeping Jixin's nerves on high alert.

Even such a simple act as carrying someone on one's back, something so simple, felt exhaustingly cautious to Jixin, fearing the slightest misstep that would expose him to the scorpion's attack.

Jixin finally got Bi Hai onto his back, but he dared not breathe a sigh of relief. Because the relaxation at the moment of reaching one's goal after a tense struggle was the perfect time for a stealth attack. Trained specifically against this, naturally, Jixin wouldn't make such a foolish mistake. He barely glanced up to see the scorpion resembling a small mountain nearby.

He noticed the Black Mirror Scorpion's incredible patience, motionlessly standing guard, menacingly swinging its two massive tails. But as he watched, Jixin suddenly realized something was amiss, though his mind, overtaxed from tension, was slow to catch on.

Just then, Bi Hai shifted behind him, touching the spot where the scorpion's thick tails had struck him. Although the Spatial Evasion had shielded him from the Scorpion Tail Needles, the massive force still tore his back muscles. Bi Hai's movement sent a sharp pain through Jixin, who then suddenly remembered something!

"The thing that hit my back had three tails, but now, why are there only two..." Jixin's expression turned pale as he spoke, followed by a grimace more painful than tears. Without another word, he clung tightly to Bi Hai, rolling to one side vigorously. At the same time, all his light red and deep purple runes appeared, and a light red Pagoda with purple runes materialized above him.

Just as Jixin rolled aside, a sand column rose where he had just been standing. As the yellow sand fell, a poisonous Scorpion Tail from the Black Mirror Scorpion appeared. Indeed no ordinary beast, the scorpion knew how to paralyze its opponent and then stealthily attack from below. A moment later, and Jixin and Bi Hai would have been skewered by that tail.

But almost simultaneously, a dark Iron Pincer appeared at Jixin's side. With no time to dodge, the pincer clamped down on the red Pagoda on Jixin's body. Seeing the Pagoda withstand the Black Mirror Scorpion's attack, Jixin was relieved, but his face quickly showed dismay.

Although the red pagoda had blocked the first attack from the iron pincers, as the Black Mirror Scorpion gradually exerted more force, the red pagoda actually began to show cracks. "It seems my Ming Wang Immovable Tower can only hold off the attack for a moment; my cultivation is still insufficient.

If it were my master's Ming Wang Pagoda, it would surely not fear the Black Mirror Scorpion's attack." No sooner had he finished speaking than the red pagoda shattered with a loud bang, directly thwarting his plan to rely on the Ming Wang Immovable Tower to hold off the Black Mirror Scorpion while waking Bi Hai.

At the instant the pagoda shattered, Jixin was already pushing off with his feet, and suddenly two pairs of wings sprouted on his back, shooting forward like a red bolt of lightning. However, the Black Mirror Scorpion's reaction speed was in no way inferior to Jixin's. The moment it crushed the pagoda, another iron pincer was already clawing at the fleeing Jixin.

Seeing the iron pincer approaching like a black whirlwind, Jixin knew he probably couldn't avoid it just by dodging, he had no choice but to reluctantly form the Ming Wang Immovable Tower again and continue fleeing forward. In fact, Jixin had no idea where it would be safe to flee to at that moment, but his target this time was the center of the City of Ruins.

Rather than running aimlessly in other directions, it made more sense to head straight into the depths. Even if he were to die, he would die in the center of the city.

Otherwise, as a peak-strength fighter of the Myriad Spirits Realm, to be killed by a giant scorpion on the periphery would definitely bring shame upon the Myriad Spirits Realm. Similarly, the pagoda he formed this time only managed to block the first strike from the iron pincer; it was immediately crushed into pieces afterward.

But that was enough for Jixin to seize the chance to continue his escape.

"I, Jixin, swear that if I do not die this time, I will definitely cultivate the Ming Wang Immovable Tower to its highest level!" he roared. But just after his shout, he was suddenly pelted with a large mass of soil to his side, causing him to stumble, yet fortunately, the force wasn't particularly strong, so Jixin didn't fall over.

Taking the opportunity to look back, Jixin's hair stood on end, for he saw the Black Mirror Scorpion with its two giant iron pincers, and its three tails incessantly quivering. With every quiver, a large mass of soil condensed into a floating boulder in the air. And at that moment, there were thousands of such large boulders in sight.

The one that had just hit him was probably the smallest of them. Moreover, Jixin had a feeling that the Black Mirror Scorpion didn't intend to kill him right away but was toying with him like a cat with a mouse. Because if it really wanted to kill him, he most likely would have died during its surprise underground attack with the scorpion tail.

And it was the same case now, that last attack was clearly a warning for him to be aware of the situation behind him. Otherwise, if those thousands of mana-fortified boulders fell, he would definitely be blocked, and then with a single strike of the Black Mirror Scorpion's iron pincer, he would certainly die.

Additionally, since it could control the Earth Element to form large boulders, it could also incorporate venom from its scorpion tail into them, which would mean that just one hit would undoubtably be lethal.

Although the Black Mirror Scorpion's mocking ignited a fire within him, making him want to turn around and fight it to the death, reason compelled Jixin to grit his teeth and continue fleeing forward.

This time was even more wretched, not only did he have to continuously form the Ming Wang Immovable Tower to block the iron pincer's attacks, but he also had to keep dodging the huge boulders coming from behind, while also ensuring that Bi Hai on his back didn't fall off or get struck by the boulders.

It was truly a time full of unspeakable hardship and extreme distress.

"Not bad, he didn't abandon his companion in the face of danger, and he didn't let anger cloud his judgement in the face of provocation. This man should be called Jixin, right? What a pity, his attribute doesn't match mine. Oh well, let's watch the others!"

A somewhat playful voice emanated from deep beneath the City Lord's Mansion at the center of the City of Ruins. However, the voice wasn't loud and went unheard by anyone.