Chapter 73: Fighting the elements (3)

Yun Jhin looked at the wind that took form around him, he finally reached the wind danger zone after a few days of traveling, the wind danger zone was the most special as it was always moving in a random pattern.

Sometimes it would even hit villages or cities, destroying them with ease, but to combat this the Emperor created a formation that would tell everyone where the wind danger zone would hit again, after that, the place that was targeted would be warned, luckily, the danger zone only moved around the borders of the Empire so it didn't hit the truly important regions.

Yun Jhin watched the wind take a physical form, the speed and density of the wind were quite high so if Yun Jhin wanted to jump into the zone he would have to fully cloak his body with ki and then use his katana to cut through the wind to make a path.

Yun Jhin's body was engulfed into a white aura that conformed to the wind elemental energy then took out the katana, he would do a combination of trying to reach the eye of the storm and cutting through if he got near enough to enter the weak spot of the danger zone he would be able to drift away into its neutral zones where the wind wouldn't batter him every second.

Yun Jhin breathed in and out as he put his sword in front of him then slashed downwards, a void was created in front of him as all of the wind and air disappeared, then he dashed directly inside!

Yun Jhin entered inside the danger zone and the wind restored itself. Afterward, the wind started to attack his body and soul trying to cut him into pieces, seemingly as if it was angry Yun Jhin created a void of air a few seconds ago.

Yun Jhin endured the pain of his body being slashed by thousands of wind blades with ease, after all, his constitution was superior.

After a while of flowing with the wind he finally reached the neutral zones and was dropped there, being in the danger zone was just like being into a palace made of wind, right now he was around 20,000 meters away from the ground, he sighed as he looked around and found one herb that he could use.

Herbs in the wind danger zone were the hardest to gather as they were made of pure wind and were not truly 'herbs' in a sense, they could be called crystallized wind energy.

Yun Jhin started to do to some handseals as he approached the crystal flower in front of him, suddenly his eyes narrowed as he backed away and disappeared.

Three men and one woman were taken by the wind to the same neutral area he stood in before minutes ago, their cultivation bases were around the 5th to 6th stage and their aura was quite bountiful, meaning that they were actual experts! They were people that were even above Lulu's power and not because of experience they just had a higher innate talent, their talent was even above Yun Jhin's!

Yun Jhin stealthily used his soul willpower to scan them and realized all of them had a pure draconic aura, they were pure dragon experts!

All of them were very young, looking to be around 15-16 years old, they were newborn infants in a pure dragons age, most dragons lived around 50,000 years when they were in the King Realm, they had more life span than humans and halflings.

The draconic newcomers started to look around then they shouted with joy as they saw the crystallized flower that Yun Jhin wanted to take, Yun Jhin frowned as he backed away from the flower and kept steady breathing, he kept his aura, life force, and presence hid to not attract their attention if any of those leaked out he would be doomed!

After all, who knew if they were good or bad people, the percentage of bad people in the cultivation world was higher than the good ones so he had to be on his toes around everyone that he didn't know.

The quartet approached the crystal flower then took a premade formation out of their spatial ring, the formation engulfed the crystalline flower making it look like it now sat neatly inside a yellow bottle.

One of the men took the bottle and put it in their spatial ring then bowed towards the woman as he said:

"We are quite lucky to get such a rare crystal flower so easily, it must be because you are with us Zula."

Zula frowned as he looked at the man and said:

"Don't call me by my first name, we aren't that familiar, if it wasn't for my father asking to invite you to this expedition you wouldn't be here!"

The man scratched the back of his head as he said:

"Ok, ok madam Lu, do you want some music to entertain yourself during this nice evening?"

It was obvious the man was making fun of Zula, but she nodded her head at him with a serious expression as she said:

"Play the Zither for me and I will leave you with your fingers."

The man coughed and took out a zither, he made a joke now, and if he didn't play his zither that crazy woman would cut off his fingers!

Fortunately, he knew how to play the zither quite adequately.

Yun Jhin ignored the man's song as he observed the other two men talking:

"Man what a bore, we have to listen to Zucco's song, whatever, we got a crystal herb, we will just need to get a few more before we can leave, I don't really want to stay near Zula..."

Zula narrowed her eyes as she heard some of their conversations and questioned:

"What was that?"

The man chuckled and said it was nothing. Zula decided to ignore them as she listened to Zucco's song.

While the group talked Yun Jhin was made a strategical retreat running away as far as he could from the area, he wasn't sure if they were from the main Luo Empire or the Bumi Empire but they were more advanced than those he met in the Zumo empire.

Well, he wasn't sure about the true geniuses that were hiding in closed-door cultivation, but the ones he saw were too trash to be called 'geniuses'.

Yun Jhin sighed as he looked around and scanned the new region of the danger zone he was.

Hopefully, these fellows would take a different region.

Yun Jhin's eyes sparkled as he found another crystallized herb and immediately took it, he created a similar formation to the one the others used then put the herb into his spatial ring, he became invisible again just as a precaution as he wandered around the wind danger zone, from time to time he would go further in then retreat as he saw those four didn't leave the beginning area already.

It seemed Zula heard what they said about wanting to not stay around her and she forced them to stay with her in the first region...

Yun Jhin continued to take different routes around the danger zones and found some herbs here and there but he was still lacking one main herb that he needed to use for his pill, so he decided to go in further into the wind palace, he met with some wind crystal beasts but he easily avoided the stronger ones and slaughtered the weaker ones taking their beast cores.

Searching high and low in the danger zone until he hit a wall, not a proverbial one but a true one, it was a wind wall, it seemed he reached a part of the wind palace that he couldn't go through so he had to go back, but when he looked behind his sharp ears caught the trace of talking, who else could it be but those 4?

The men laughed while Zula kept to herself, Yun Jhin kept himself near the wind wall as he turned transparent but he didn't touch the wall or else it would shred him to pieces, the wind wasn't very merciful as they were quite far in the wind palace.

Suddenly Zula narrowed her eyes as she walked closer to the wall, her face was close to Yun Jhin's and he could almost smell her breath, Yun Jhin wanted to move back but the wind wall was behind him, any wrong step and he would become slashed meat!

Zula watched the wall for a few more seconds before she turned back and shook her head as she said:

"This is not the secret entrance, father did say that it would be a wall but I can't feel the energy gathering formation, let's go search for some more time and if we can't find it till the night we will go camp to take a rest."

Zula was the 'captain' of this unit so she was the one who gave out the orders, Yun Jhin watched as Zula left with the three men and sighed, in the end his stealth technique didn't betray him.

Yun Jhin waited for a while before he made sure they weren't around and left the dead end, he walked around the wind palace for a long while, he didn't admire the surroundings as he was too stressed by these four people, he needed to find the last herb and get away from the wind danger zone, there was also around 5 more days till the formation inside him would let him leave, but he didn't think that would be a problem.

He searched and searched but he didn't find anything besides more dead ends, the winds grew harsher, stronger, faster, they tore at his cloak and clothes, at his body, his ki was running low but whenever that happened he would eat a pill from his spatial ring and continue further.

Finally, after two more days, he found a wall that wasn't like the others, it was the wall Zula was talking about, he could sense a gathering formation near the wall that would open it for the one who put his/hers ki inside it.

Yun Jhin knew that his ki would be no good for the formation, so he decided to wait in stealth for the others to arrive, it would be a lie if Yun Jhin said he wasn't interested in what was behind the wall, he also didn't find the herb he needed, maybe there would be more herbs inside the wall and he could take some while the others would be preoccupied with the true treasure.

After a short while of waiting the quartet party arrived, Zula walked forward and put her hand on the wall, unsurprisingly the sharp wind wall didn't tear her hand apart as a dark green formation appeared on it and started to suck the ki out of her.

Her complexion started to pale as her ki was forcefully sucked out of her, after three minutes she almost collapsed but the wall also opened.

Zucco gave her a pill then helped her up, Zula nodded at him then entered the wall along with others, Yun Jhin followed them behind like a shadow.

Yun Jhin's eyes narrowed as he looked around, the pure white wind was all around him, as he followed behind them he realized that the place was really narrow and only two people could walk shoulder to shoulder inside the wall.

Yun Jhin made sure there wasn't any physical contact with any of them as he kept himself as behind as he could from their party.

After a short while of walking forward, they reached an open place as the walls widened around, the place looked to be touched by a cultivators hand as there were different things around, special crystallized herbs, treasured weapons, rugs of different colors, this room he was in gave out a homely feel.

There was no one in the room Zula looked around then said:

"Walk in further and press the painting on the wall, click on it 3 times right, 2 times left and 1 time down, the true treasure should be inside that hidden room."

Yun Jhin watched as they disappeared behind a painting, fortunately for him, the herb he needed was growing inside the room, unfortunately, was that he couldn't harvest it while invisible, the formation that he created would take a bit out of him ki wise, and he also needed to concentrate, unlike the others, he couldn't create formations that could be used later as he didn't have the ingredients needed to do that.

Yun Jhin quickly started to do handseals as he tried to take the herb he needed, after a short while the herb was bottled then he put it in his spatial ring but at the same time, the quartet left the secret room and spotted him!

Yun Jhin only had one thought right now:

"S-H-I-T!"

Yun Jhin didn't know what to say so he only waved awkwardly before he was apprehended by two of the men.

He really was in deep trouble right now, but he had a way to get himself out, the first step would be charming Zula as she was the captain.