A Mortal's Start in the Spirit Beast Mountain

Chapter 12 First Encounter with Old Demon Han

Luo Ming's heart skipped a beat. He turned to Han Yunzhi beside him and asked, "Yunzhi, do you know any cultivators from Yellow Maple Valley?"

"Yellow Maple Valley?" Han Yunzhi was taken aback at first, then followed Luo Ming's gaze to look at the group from Yellow Maple Valley. Her eyes lit up quickly, and she said happily, "I recognize the one on the far left! He bought a lot of things from me during the last Tainan Small Gathering."

Luo Ming looked in the direction she pointed and raised an eyebrow slightly: "The one on the far left? This one doesn't look like 'plain-looking' at all." In his opinion, this cultivator's appearance was almost identical to his own.

Just then, the Huangfeng Valley cultivator recognized by Han Yunzhi seemed to sense something and looked towards Luo Ming. His gaze immediately fell on Han Yunzhi, clearly recognizing the girl who had previously patronized her stall. He smiled and nodded at her, and Han Yunzhi immediately lowered her head shyly, while cautiously glancing at Luo Ming beside her.

At this moment, Old Demon Han also looked at Luo Ming beside him. The moment their eyes met, Luo Ming nodded slightly as a greeting.

A sense of vigilance and doubt immediately arose in Han Laomo's heart: "Does this person recognize me?" He secretly sized up Luo Ming and saw that the other party was dressed in ordinary clothes and had a steady aura. He was already at the peak of Qi Refining and was not someone he knew.

"Did we meet at the Tai Nan Small Gathering? Or did we bump into each other on some other occasion?" He thought again. He always kept a low profile and rarely made friends with others. The cultivator in front of him had an open and honest look in his eyes and did not seem to have any ill intentions. However, people in the cultivation world are unpredictable, so he had to be careful.

Han Laomo suppressed his doubts, returned the nod, remembered Luo Ming's appearance, and then looked away, as if the brief eye contact had never happened.

After exchanging glances with Old Demon Han, Luo Ming's gaze quickly fell on a shrewd-looking, smooth-talking old man beside him. "Could this be Xiang Zhili?"

The thought had barely formed when the old man seemed to sense his gaze and abruptly turned to look at him. This sudden reaction startled Luo Ming, who quickly averted his gaze, pretending it was just a casual glance, and instead began to scrutinize the Yellow Maple Valley cultivator beside him.

"I hope I don't run into him in the forbidden area. If I'm unlucky enough to do, it's best to stay far away." Luo Ming was secretly wary. "I heard he entered the forbidden area to find some kind of talisman. As long as I don't compete with him, we should be fine."

As his gaze swept around, he noticed a woman with a cool and aloof demeanor. She was beautiful, with an indifferent expression, showing no interest in anyone around her, like an iceberg. "This must be Senior Sister Chen. Her temperament is truly outstanding. No wonder Old Devil Han couldn't resist kissing her back then, and then denied it. Sigh, what a scumbag!" Luo Ming couldn't help but complain. If he had been in that situation, he might have taken her in.

Next, Luo Ming's gaze swept among the cultivators from various sects. It was quite a novel experience to encounter so many cultivators from other sects for the first time.

Besides their own sect and Huangfeng Valley, there were five other teams gathered in the arena, each with its own logo. Although they were clearly distinct from one another, there were still many eyes secretly observing each other.

The most eye-catching were the disciples of the Hidden Moon Sect, all dressed in moon-white robes with silver patterns. The male cultivators were tall and straight with clear eyes, while the female cultivators mostly wore pink and white or light purple long skirts. Each of them was slender and charming, and their skirts swayed lightly as they walked, attracting the attention of many male cultivators from other sects.

Two cultivators next to Luo Ming were huddled together, whispering amongst themselves, their eyes occasionally glancing toward the female cultivator from the Hidden Moon Sect.

"This junior sister from the Hidden Moon Sect is indeed beautiful; I wouldn't even dare to fight her if I encountered her in the forbidden area."

Luo Ming also noticed a young girl among them. Although she looked young, she was surrounded by a cold and aloof aura. No other Qi Refining cultivators dared to approach her easily within a few steps. Luo Ming thought to himself, "This must be Fairy Nangong, right?" Thinking of what would happen between this woman and Old Demon Han in the future, he couldn't help but click his tongue twice.

After a while, as if they had planned it together, the seven factions flew off together toward a certain place.

After flying for several more hours, the group finally landed in a desolate place.

Everyone waited until the restrictions of the forbidden area reached their weakest point. Then, the seven Golden Core cultivators unleashed their magic weapons and displayed their supernatural abilities, battling fiercely against the ancient wind-attribute restrictions outside the blood-red forbidden area for several hours before finally opening up a circular passage about ten feet high.

"Get inside right now!" someone shouted in a low voice.

It's unclear which sect made the first move, but several figures shot into the entrance like arrows. Immediately afterward, cultivators from various sects abandoned their restraints, using their escape techniques or movement skills to rush in.

Luo Ming didn't rush forward. He took a deep breath and whispered to Han Yunzhi beside him, "After you go in, try to hide as much as possible. Your priority is to find spiritual herbs and protect yourselves. Don't force it." After saying that, he moved swiftly and rode his magical artifact into the passage.

The moment he crossed the end of the passage, a dizzying sensation washed over him, as if he had been thrown into a spinning top. The next instant, his feet found solid ground, and the world around him suddenly went silent. Luo Ming immediately steadied himself and warily looked around.

He found himself in a dark red woodland. The trees were strangely shaped, their branches twisted like struggling arms, their leaves a sickly purplish-red. The ground was soft and damp, and the metallic smell in the air was stronger, mixed with a faint, sweet, fishy odor. The sky was shrouded in mist, obscuring the sun and moon.

"This is the Crimson Forbidden Land..." Luo Ming thought with a chill. He could sense that although the spiritual energy of heaven and earth here was abundant, it was unusually turbulent, mixed with a kind of unsettling malevolent aura. Cultivating here for a long time would probably affect one's temperament.

He didn't release his spirit beast immediately. Instead, he concealed his aura, leaped onto a tall tree, and used the dense foliage to hide himself. At the same time, he used his "Heavenly Eye Technique" to carefully survey his surroundings. Only after confirming that there were no other cultivators or powerful demonic beasts within a hundred feet did he relax slightly, take out the jade slip containing the forbidden area map, and compare it with the surrounding terrain.

"Current location... near the edge of the eastern 'Weeping Blood Forest'. Jade Marrow Fungus and Purple Monkey Flower mostly grow deep in the forest or at special spiritual vein nodes, so you need to explore to the west or northeast."

Luo Ming quickly planned his route. His primary objective was to obtain the main medicinal ingredients needed for the mission, and only then would he go to Yinfeng Valley to find the Blood Spirit Fruit.

He didn't choose the relatively "safe" path marked on the map—those places had undoubtedly been explored by countless predecessors, and even if there were any remaining spiritual herbs, they would most likely be traps or focal points of contention. Luo Ming pointed to a spot on the map, where an area called "Misty Valley" was marked as "Gathering of low-level demonic beasts, pervasive poisonous miasma, unknown growth points of spiritual herbs, dangerous."

"The more dangerous and harsh the environment, the fewer people who have ventured there before, and the greater the chance of finding high-grade spiritual herbs. I have four spirit beasts, especially the rock python which is sensitive to the earth's energy, the black tortoise which is resistant to poison, the wind fox which has extraordinary spiritual senses, and the fire crow which can scout from high altitudes. They are perfect for exploring such areas." Luo Ming made up his mind, determined the direction, and silently slid down the tree.