The golden-robed man gave an anguished howl as a massive hole appeared in his abdomen, but such a wound still wasn't enough to kill him.

His face was twisted with agony, but he immediately made a hand seal before pressing his hand toward the wound. Before his hand had even come into contact with his own body, a burst of black Qi had begun to emerge from his palm, clearly indicating that he was planning to administer self-treatment.

However, in the next instant, countless specks of golden light suddenly appeared within the wound, and the golden-robed man let loose a thunderous roar of despair upon seeing this, but it was already too late.

The specks of light instantly transformed into golden threads, then shot forth in all directions.

In the blink of an eye, countless holes had been punched into the golden-robed man's body, following which he crumbled away into countless scraps of flesh and blood that rained down from the heavens.

The golden crab's powers were truly unfathomable; it had slain the Nie Pan clone with ease even without using the third attack.

Even the clone's Nascent Soul hadn't managed to escape the ravaging golden threads.

Han Li released his spiritual sense as blue light flashed through his eyes, and he heaved a long sigh of relief after ascertaining that no fragments of the clone's soul had escaped. He then cast his gaze down toward the giant golden crab as a hesitant look appeared on his face.

"I've already unleashed two attacks, and I still owe you one attack. If you need it now, you can come back to me at a later date. However, I can only remain here, so you'll have to lure your enemy to this place before I can attack them," the golden crab said in an indifferent voice as the golden light radiating from its body dimmed slightly.

Han Li faltered slightly upon hearing this before asking, "Why are you unable to leave this place?"

"Without sufficient immortal spiritual power, I won't be able to move much before I run out of energy," the golden crab explained.

Han Li's expression changed slightly upon hearing this. "What are you referring to when you say immortal spiritual power?"

"I'm referring to the energy of heaven and earth imbued within your offerings. I only agree to lend my assistance to those who can offer me things that contain this type of power. I'm a puppet, so every single move I make expends immortal spiritual power. As such, I keep half of the immortal spiritual power within the offerings I receive as compensation," the golden crab replied.

A thought suddenly occurred to Han Li, and he asked, "I see. Are you a Faux Immortal Puppet? I can see that you've attained intelligence, so it would only be right of me to refer to you as a fellow daoist. May I ask how long that drop of Heavenly Fortune Liquid that I gave you will be able to fuel you?"

"I am a Faux Immortal Puppet that was refined in the upper realm, and I came to this realm due to an accident. My former master perished during that accident, and after many years, I was able to attain a hint of autonomous spiritual nature. The elixir that you gave me isn't true Heavenly Fortune Elixir, but it's half as efficacious as the real thing, and it's the purest elixir that I've been offered since arriving in this realm. That drop of Faux Immortal Elixir can support me for two months. Of course, that's under the assumption that I don't have to face anyone in battle during that time. Otherwise, it'll only be able to support me for a few attacks," the golden crab replied.

"I see, so you're stuck here purely due to insufficient energy," Han Li said in a contemplative manner.

"You can say that. I chose to remain here as this place has the greatest abundance of spiritual Qi in this entire realm, so I can hibernate here without expending any energy. Once I accumulate enough immortal spiritual power, perhaps I'll be able to return to the upper realm," the golden crab said.

"When you say upper realm, you're referring to the True Immortal Realm, right?" Han Li asked.

"That's right. You lower realm beings refer to it as the True Immortal Realm, but those from the True Immortal Realm refer to it as the upper realm," the golden crab replied.

"Looks like your former master had to have been a true immortal to possess a puppet as powerful as you. Would you be willing to follow me for some time if I can provide you with enough energy?" Han Li suddenly asked.

The golden crab was silent for a long while upon hearing this before replying, "I wouldn't be opposed to that if you can offer me a drop of Faux Immortal Liquid of that level of purity every month. However, you'll have to offer me additional compensation if you want me to assist you in battle. On top of that, I'll leave once I accumulate enough energy, and you're not allowed to try and stop me."

"How much time would it take you to accumulate enough immortal spiritual power?" Han Li asked after a brief hesitation.

"My immortal spiritual power conversion component has been severely damaged, so I'll only be able to convert one drop of that Faux Immortal Liquid at most per month. If you can offer me one drop of elixir per month, I should accumulate enough after just over 1,000 years," the golden crab replied.

"1,000 years, eh? Hehe, alright, I'll give you one drop of that Faux Immortal Liquid per month, so come with me," Han Li said with a smile.

"Alright, but if you're unable to provide an offering for any month, I'll view that as a transgression and kill you on the spot," the golden crab said in a forthright manner.

Han Li hesitated momentarily upon hearing this, then gritted his teeth and nodded in response. "You have yourself a deal!"

"In that case, we can sign the temporary agreement right away," the golden crab replied as golden runes appeared all over its body again.

Immediately thereafter, it opened its mouth to expel a dark green stone slab that was around four feet in size, which hovered directly over to Han Li.

Han Li was rather wary of the stone slab, but it merely hovered on the spot without doing anything else, and only then did Han Li cast his gaze toward it.

In doing so, he discovered that there was beveled silver text flashing on the stone slab, and after carefully reading through it, he discovered this to be an agreement with the terms that the golden crab had just stipulated.

"If you have no issues with this agreement, then just expel some blood essence onto it to seal the deal," the golden crab prompted.

Han Li was quite relieved to hear this and immediately agreed.

If the golden crab had asked for a fragment of his spiritual sense or something like that, he'd have to reconsider in fear of being plotted against by some unknown restriction, but blood essence was no issue at all.

Thus, Han Li expelled a mouthful of blood essence, and as soon as it came into contact with the stone slab, it transformed into several unknown crimson runes that vanished into the stone slab in a flash.

Immediately thereafter, the stone slab flew back as a ball of green light and into the golden crab's mouth again.

"Now that the temporary agreement has been signed, I can come with you. When are we setting off?"

"Hehe, you really are a straightforward man, Fellow Daoist. We can leave right now, but before that, would you be able to adopt a form that attracts less attention?" Han Li asked with a smile.

"Sure," the golden crab replied in a nonchalant manner, following which its body began to rapidly shrink amid a flash of golden light.

Once the light faded, the golden crab was revealed to have transformed into a young clean-shaven man wearing a set of green daoist robes.

The young man appeared to be 27 to 28 years of age with a pair of golden eyes and dark green eyebrows.

He turned toward Han Li in a completely expressionless manner, and said, "You may refer to me as Daoist Xie." [1]

A hint of surprise flashed through Han Li's eyes as he reflexively swept his spiritual sense toward the young man, only to have it instantly repelled. His heart jolted slightly as he cupped his fist in a salute, and said, "It's an honor to have you with me, Senior Xie. My surname is Han, and I'm from the Spirit Realm. This is not a good place to talk; let's set off right away."

Daoist Xie naturally had no objections to this, and thus, the two of them flew into the distance as a pair of streaks of light, one azure and one golden.

......

Meanwhile, Bao Hua, Hei'e, and Yuan Yan were still hovering in the air above the Bitter Spirit Island.

All of a sudden, the two devilish patriarchs' expressions changed in unison, and they each flipped a hand over to produce a jade box.

"Haha, the wisp of spiritual sense really was removed!" the black-robed young man exclaimed in an elated manner, then swept a sleeve through the air, upon which that three-headed black wyrm appeared beneath him amid a burst of spatial fluctuations.

He flew onto the black wyrm's central head in a flash, and it let loose a low roar before sweeping toward a certain direction as a gust of black devilish wind.

In the wake of Yuan Yan's departure, his cold voice trailed along behind him. "Seeing as that Han brat kept his promise, I won't go after him, but I'm going to immediately issue the Immortal Vanquishing order, so it's going to be extremely difficult for him to go anywhere in our holy realm. Whether he'll be able to return to the Spirit Realm or not will depend on his fortune."

Bao Hua's expression remained completely unchanged upon hearing this, and she stowed away the jade box in her hand again before casting her gaze toward the sea of lightning in the direction where the golden crab was situated.

Her brows furrowed slightly with puzzlement as she murmured to herself, "How strange; I can sense that the Faux Immortal Puppet has been activated, but he still managed to get away. Could it be that he had some other life-saving trump cards up his sleeve?"

1. Xie is the pinyin pronunciation for the Chinese character for crab.