The rapidly changing yellow and red clouds churned and swirled before their eyes. All three curiously examined this strange phenomenon.
“Hehe, this is quite peculiar. I wonder if this cloud is a manifestation of the local restrictions or some unique monster,” Little Phoenix Fairy said, casually flicking her wrist to produce her crimson spear, looking quite intrigued.
“Let me test it first,” she declared, a flash of red light on her spear as she gently pointed it forward.
A ball of black flame coalesced on the spear tip. With a flick of her wrist, it transformed into a black arc of light and shot forward.
Dongfang Ya didn't stop her, but a hint of worry crossed her face.
The black flame, like a blade of light, pierced directly into the cloud. It made a few soft popping sounds, but nothing seemed amiss.
Wherever it passed, the clouds parted, and the black flame penetrated deep into the cloud, disappearing from sight.
“Huh, my Black Demon Spirit Flame was actually devoured,” Little Phoenix Fairy said, her face darkening at the sight. She shook her spear, conjuring over a dozen black flames in the air.
The flames stretched and transformed into tangible black flame spears, which she thrust forward fiercely.
This attack was much more powerful than the last.
However, the yellow and red clouds underwent a new transformation, as if provoked. In an instant, they turned crimson, and crimson flames shot out from within.
The crimson flames collided with the black flames, creating a chain of fire in the air.
The two types of flame spiritual power canceled each other out.
Zhang Ling frowned slightly, discerning some of the secrets.
He noticed that the number of flames released by the crimson cloud was equal to the number of black flame balls released by Little Phoenix Fairy.
It seemed to be reacting to Little Phoenix Fairy's attacks.
This situation resembled a counterattack-type restriction, yet it was somehow different.
Because the crimson cloud before them didn't cover a large area, only about a hundred zhang in radius.
It was out of sync with the surrounding environment, existing as an independent, strange cloud.
Ordinary array restrictions would integrate with the surrounding environment to maximize their effectiveness.
Unless this was a broken restriction, or something else entirely.
While Zhang Ling was pondering, Little Phoenix Fairy's eyes flashed with a fierce light, and she let out a low cry. She whirled her spear like a whirlwind, creating streams of black flame.
In the blink of an eye, hundreds of black flames shot towards the front like heavenly fire descending.
With a series of loud bangs, all the black flames plunged into the crimson cloud.
This time, the crimson cloud didn't seem to react in time and was instantly scattered by more than half of the attack.
The remaining small cloud, as if conscious, transformed into a hazy snake shadow and retreated backward.
Little Phoenix Fairy naturally wouldn't let this strange cloud escape. A flash of black light in her hand, and the crimson spear shot out like an arrow, directly scattering the remaining small cloud.
At the same time, a crisp clanging sound was heard, as if it had struck something hard.
Little Phoenix Fairy let out a soft 'eh,' and the spear flew back, bringing with it a broken crimson orb.
“Cloud Sister, this seems to be a seventh-order fire-attribute demon core,” Dongfang Ya immediately recognized it.
Zhang Ling also glanced at it. It was indeed a seventh-order demon core, but it had some strange spiritual patterns engraved on it, clearly having been specially refined.
Upon closer inspection, one could also sense a faint divine sense power attached to it.
Scanning with his divine sense, he could also see a hazy small snake phantom circling the demon core.
“This demon core also has a remnant soul of a small snake attached to it. No wonder the transformed cloud has some spirituality,” Little Phoenix Fairy said, understanding dawning on her face.
“However, it doesn’t pose too much of a threat to us.”
“Sister, don't be careless. The black cloud I encountered last time was much larger than this red cloud. Once you're drawn inside, you lose your sense of perception.”
“Little sister, don't worry. Now that the three of us are exploring this place together, we can handle the dangers here. We should quickly leave this area and enter the Mystical God Palace.” Little Phoenix Fairy gave Dongfang Ya a reassuring look and put away the demon core.
Gripping her spear, she flew forward once again. Zhang Ling and Dongfang Ya naturally followed closely.
Soon after, they encountered another cloud of cyan mist. Little Phoenix Fairy quickly dispersed it, and they found another demon core inside.
However, the quality of this demon core was a level lower than the one in the red cloud. It was a fifth-order wind-attribute demon core.
Thus, the three wandered in this area for over an hour. They didn't find any exits, and it seemed they were trapped in this space.
During this time, they encountered seven or eight more clouds of different colors. They easily dealt with them, and of course, there were demon cores inside. They were all fifth, sixth, and seventh-order demon cores.
However, the quality varied. The spiritual power of these demon cores was more or less depleted. Some were already dilapidated, with a great loss of spiritual power.
If taken outside, they might not even be as valuable as ordinary magical artifacts.
They didn't find this small discovery strange. After all, this place had been sealed for who knows how many years. These demon cores were obviously refined, like magical artifacts and treasures.
If they weren't maintained, the longer the time, the greater the loss would be.
After searching for a while longer, they didn't find much besides a few more strangely colored clouds.
Under these circumstances, the three of them speculated that they might have fallen into an illusion, but they could obtain demon cores by dispersing those special clouds, which was real.
Clearly, the cloud space they were in wasn't an illusion.
The three had to patiently continue exploring this area. In reality, the area they explored wasn't large, roughly three to four hundred li.
Because they had to guard against possible dangers, they didn't separate, and they deliberately slowed down their speed during the flight, constantly checking their surroundings.
After all, Dongfang Ya had been seriously injured when she came here before, so they naturally had to be cautious at all times.
At this moment, Little Phoenix Fairy, who was flying in the front, seemed to sense something again and sped towards the right.
Zhang Ling and Dongfang Ya quickly followed. Their divine senses spread out in that direction and discovered that a dozen li away, it was pitch black, a dark cloud covering the sky.
“Sister Dongfang, is this the black cloud you entered last time?” Little Phoenix Fairy approached the black cloud and stopped.
“It looks like it's the same black cloud,” Dongfang Ya said, nodding affirmatively as she looked at the dark, lightless cloud ahead. Then she added, “When I first came in, I was drawn into the black cloud. Speaking of which, it was after encountering danger in this black cloud that I was inexplicably transported out, leaving this place.”
“If that's the case, then that's right. We've explored this space for a while and haven't seen any way out. The real entrance to the Mystical God Palace might be in this black cloud,” Little Phoenix Fairy said, shaking her spear and speaking in a deep voice.
Dongfang Ya naturally understood the meaning of her words, so she turned to look at Zhang Ling, as if asking for his opinion.
Zhang Ling also smiled and replied, “Fairy's speculation is correct. We'll have to venture into this black cloud.”
Dongfang Ya smiled and didn't say anything more. She directly raised her hand and took out a palm-sized green disc. The front of the disc was smooth, like a bronze mirror. The back was engraved with many strange patterns, and the whole thing emitted a layer of green light.
Staring at the green bronze disc, Zhang Ling couldn't help but ask, “This treasure is the one that can resist divine sense attacks, right?”
“That's right, this treasure is made from a piece of Giant Soul Stone,” Dongfang Ya explained.
Zhang Ling pondered for a moment, recalling where he had seen the material Giant Soul Stone in an ancient book.
It seemed that Giant Soul Stone could release a special spiritual light. Bathed in this spiritual light, a cultivator's five senses and divine sense would become extremely sharp.
Thus, they could better react to various dangers.
But he hadn't heard of it being able to resist divine sense attacks.
Seeing how confident Dongfang Ya was, she clearly wasn't lying.
At this time, Dongfang Ya cast a few spells towards the green disc. The green disc flew up, trembled gently, and released a burst of gray-green light, covering her.
Then, the gray-green light flowed quickly, slowly expanding to about three zhang in size. Dongfang Ya's voice came from within, “Sister Yun, Fellow Daoist Zhang, come in too. The spiritual light released by this treasure can only cover this much space.”
Little Phoenix Fairy entered without hesitation. Zhang Ling hesitated for a moment, then flashed and stood in the light.
He happened to be on Dongfang Ya's left side, only half a zhang away from her. He saw the woman's delicate face.
Coincidentally, Dongfang Ya was also looking in his direction. Their eyes met. Zhang Ling couldn't help but freeze for a moment.
Dongfang Ya, however, smiled at him generously and said softly, “We're going in now.” She immediately walked towards the black cloud.
A look of embarrassment flashed across Zhang Ling's face, but he quickly recovered and followed closely beside her.
Little Phoenix Fairy didn't seem to notice the strange look between the two of them. Instead, she clapped her hands lightly and put away the crimson spear in her hand.
She replaced it with a black-red orb-shaped magical treasure. She pointed at it, and the orb released a layer of black flame, protecting the front right.
Zhang Ling naturally knew what she meant. He also quickly released three green-gold flying swords, protecting the left side.
The three of them entered the black cloud in this way. It was pitch black inside, and their divine sense couldn't probe very far. There seemed to be some strange restriction that suppressed their divine sense power.
Fortunately, all three were Core Formation cultivators, so they could probe quickly.
Being in the black cloud, they didn't encounter any danger. It was just that there was black mist everywhere, making people feel a bit oppressed.
They had encountered many of these strange clouds before and understood some of their secrets.
As long as they didn't release too much spiritual power fluctuations, these clouds wouldn't launch an attack.
The three restrained their auras and scanned the vicinity with their divine sense. This would avoid some trouble.
Of course, they had also thought about directly dispersing this black cloud. But the area covered by this black cloud was extremely large, which couldn't be done easily.
So they could only use this relatively safe method to investigate it.
As they went deeper into the cloud, the clouds inside were constantly undergoing strange changes.
At this moment, the black cloud in front rolled and transformed into a huge black bird. It was vaguely shaped, only having a rough outline.
The black bird spread its wings and flew high, shuttling through the clouds a few times before transforming back into clouds and dissipating.
As if it hadn't appeared, but the cloud in front quickly entangled and flowed, creating a gust of strong wind.
Dongfang Ya naturally wouldn't be foolish enough to rush into it. She went around half a circle from the side and passed by.
But before they had gone far, the black cloud in front rolled again, transforming into a giant snake more than ten zhang long, and a demonic wolf fighting each other.
The two fought fiercely, biting and colliding with each other. They saw clumps of black clouds constantly stirring together, forming countless strange black vortexes.
As soon as they approached this side, they could feel a suction force coming from the vortexes. It felt like they were being pulled into it.
All three were not ordinary cultivators, so they were not affected and easily avoided it.
The deeper they went, the more strange scenes appeared.
Sometimes, a phantom of a demon beast would suddenly appear. Sometimes, among the demon beasts, there were some vague buildings, mountains, rivers, and other more realistic scenes.
But this was not an illusion. Instead, it was a phantom formed by the entanglement and change of this black cloud.
Although the phantoms were all blurry and gray-black, and it could be seen at a glance that they were not real scenes, spiritual power fluctuations could be sensed in each phantom. Clearly, there was some kind of killing intent.
Without thinking, they knew that there was some kind of special restriction in the cloud, which was different from the strange clouds they had seen before.
If this place was really the Mystical God Palace, these restrictions were most likely created by the legendary Godlight True Person.
This ancient cultivator was said to be extremely proficient in illusion techniques. It was not surprising that he could create these restrictions.
In the blink of an eye, a quarter of an hour had passed. Although the three of them had not been flying at full speed and had been vigilant at all times, they had also explored an area of more than a hundred li.
But they still hadn't seen a possible entrance.
After going deeper for a while, the black cloud became thinner, and they saw a patch of light in the distance.
“Little sister, be careful,” Little Phoenix Fairy said in a deep voice.
Although this woman looked a bit reckless, she could have the strength of the middle stage of the Core Formation stage, so she was naturally not really without any schemes.
Dongfang Ya also slightly slowed down her speed. The three's divine senses probed forward.
Zhang Ling frowned, sensing that the black cloud in front had dissipated. It seemed that they had walked out of the black cloud area. The scene over there was quite lively. It looked like a small town, or a market where immortal cultivators came and went.
More than a dozen wide streets appeared in front, with shops, teahouses, and other buildings located in an orderly manner. On the street at the very front, they could see twenty or thirty pedestrians walking among them.
Behind the town, there seemed to be a few large mountains surrounded by clouds and mist, but they couldn't see them clearly.
In a moment, the three of them passed through the black cloud and stood on the street.
Dongfang Ya turned her head and muttered, “Godlight Town.”
There was a huge black stone on the left side of the street, with three large words written on it in silver, shimmering characters: Godlight Town.
At this time, an old man with white hair was leaning against the stone. He seemed to have noticed the arrival of the three of them and looked over.
