Despite the fact that everyone urged him to stay, Nie Tian still chose to leave the group.

The reason he gave was that the desert was more suitable for his cultivation.

Of course, Jiang Lingzhu and Pan Tao didn’t believe that for a minute.

After all, only Qi warriors with a flame cultivation attribute would be able to rapidly enhance their cultivation bases in the desert.

However, so far there hadn’t been any sign that Nie Tian had such a cultivation attribute.

Even if Nie Tian’s cultivation attribute was indeed flame, the volcano area, where Zheng Bin and other Mystic Mist sect disciples were, should be a better place for him to cultivate.

Therefore, everyone was sure that it was merely an excuse. However, they still couldn’t understand why Nie Tian chose to leave while they were facing the double threat of the Blood sect and the Ghost sect.

Meanwhile, Nie Tian didn’t give them a reasonable explanation. He simply parted with the group while carrying hundreds of kilograms of Lurker Lizard’s meat on his back.

Having parted ways with the group, Nie Tian walked alone for half a day before coming to find a secluded sand dune. Then he started to devour the Lurker Lizard’s meat non-stop, as he proceeded with his cultivation.

He didn’t want to waste any more time. He only wished to consume all the meat before the energy that it contained completely faded away.

The only reason why he had risked his life and left the group was that he wished to break through into the eighth level of Qi Refining with the help of the Lurker Lizard meat as soon as possible.

He didn’t dare to waste another second.

During the next two days, all he did was wolf down the meat and cultivate around the clock!

As the result, it only took him two days to expand his spiritual sea by another thirty percent.

Since he was no longer marching at a fast pace, and not worrying about anything else for that matter, he used all of his time to cultivate. In this way, his cultivation improved even faster than he had anticipated.

Not only did his cultivation base improve significantly, but as his fleshy body grew stronger, the range of his psychic power reached as far as ninety meters!

He enjoyed the process, and the result of seeing improvement every day. The feeling of himself becoming more powerful every day made him go all out with his heart and soul.

…

On the other hand, in the desert...

Yu Tong of the Blood Sect held a dark-red compass in her hand. She bit her fingertip and dripped a drop of fresh blood onto its surface, whereupon it turned into countless thin strands of blood which swam about in the compass, as if they were alive.

Then, a misty blood aura was released from the compass, making it look more mysterious than ever.

Soon after, the thin strands of roaming blood lines gradually permeated the compass, disappearing one after another.

“Appear!” exclaimed Yu Tong.

Instantly, tiny, blood-colored lights emerged from the compass, flickering and wiggling slowly.

Mo Xi of the Ghost Sect, as well as everyone else, began to slowly edge closer. “The Blood Searching Compass of the Blood sect really is magical and true to its name!” Mo Xi said with sincere admiration.

He knew that each and every blood-colored light on the compass represented the fluctuations of Qi and blood, symbolizing living beings.

A large number of blood-colored lights gathered in one spot, and moving unceasingly, meant that a group of people were traveling together.

Eyes fixed his on the compass, Du Kun said, “Nineteen blood-colored lights represent nineteen people. If I’m correct, those are the trial takers from the Spiritual Treasure sect and the Cloudsoaring sect.”

“Yee?!” He reached out his hand, pointing at a solitary blood-colored dot on the compass. “How come there’s one person here?”

Mo Xi looked over with rapt attention, and found that there was quite a distance between that light and the other nineteen lights. Obviously, they weren’t in the same place.

The group of lights were on the move, while the single light didn’t move at all and instead remained at its original spot.

“I guess this person... has been kicked out of the team.” Du Kun from the Ghost Sect giggled. “That guy must be a trouble maker. They knew perfectly well that we would chase after him, yet kicked him out anyways. Clearly, they didn’t care if he died. Only a guy who displeases everyone would be removed from the group in a situation like this. Pathetic.”

At this time, Yu Tong put the Blood Searching Compass away, and pointed in a direction. “That way. Fifteen kilometers from here, there’s someone all alone.”

Brow furrowed, Mo Xi turned to Du Kun, “Our main target is the group of disciples from the Cloudsoaring sect and Spiritual Treasure sect. It isn’t worth it for all of us to change direction just for one person. Whoever this guy is who got kicked out of the group, it can’t possibly be Jiang Lingzhu or An Ying. With your strength, you can kill whoever it is, as long as it’s not one of those two.”

Du Kun understood immediately. “I’ll go kill him.”

“Okay, regroup with us once you get rid of him,” said Mo Xi. “Don’t take too long.”

“Got it.”

Du Kun followed the direction that Yu Tong had indicated, and left the group.

Mo Xi called out, “Move faster guys, we have to catch up to them and kill them in the desert. We can’t allow them to get into the volcano area.”

“Let’s go!”

…

Nie Tian sat there cross-legged, surrounded by numerous sand dunes, the five fingers of his right hand spread out.

FIZZ! FIZZ!

Countless strands of spiritual light emanated from his fingertips.

They followed the fluctuations of his mind and coiled around his fingers like slender, electrical snakes, weaving back and forth between the gaps of his fingers.

“The seventh level,” whispered Nie Tian. “Spiritual power breakaway.”

At this time, he had just consumed a huge amount of dried spirit beast meat. The meat was still being digested, and the energy within hadn’t dispersed yet.

Before practicing the Qi Refining Incantation, he attempted to practice the spiritual power breakaway of the seventh level of Qi Refining.

To his surprise, it went perfectly well. When his spiritual power flowed along his meridians into his fingers, strands of spiritual power wasn’t met with any kind of obstacle, and effortlessly broke away from his fingertips.

Soon, he made another shocking discovery: the embodiments of spiritual power actually left his fingertips in form of strands of bright light, and he could sense them and even control them with his psychic power!

Looking at the strands of spiritual light dancing around at his command, Nie Tian had nothing but joy on his face.

Faintly, he had a feeling that the stronger his psychic power, the more accurately he would be able to sense and control his spiritual power.

Plus, he was born with his psychic power stronger than others. While he strengthened his fleshy body, his psychic power had also improved by the day.

Now, his psychic awareness was already able to cover a radius of one hundred meters!

This meant his psychic power was skyrocketing, far surpassing other Qi warriors at his cultivation stage.

With a stronger psychic power, he would have a better command of his spiritual power. When strands of his spiritual power left his body, he would be able to command them to vary their form, exactly according to his will.

“Awesome!” he declared, laughing, his spirits high.

As of this moment, the spirit beast meat he had wolfed down moments ago had already been digested, and gradually started to generate power.

Nie Tian quickly calmed his joyful heart, and without any hesitation, started to practice the Qi Refining Incantation.

He believed that if he managed to consume the hundreds of kilograms of meat before the energy it contained degraded significantly, he would soon be able to break through into the eighth level of Qi Refining.

THUMP! THUMP!

The clear sound of footsteps suddenly rang out, which grew louder and louder.

Nie Tian only desired to practice cultivation when he heard the sound. His expression suddenly flickered, and without much thinking, he once again released his psychic awareness to sense the anomalies in the vicinity.

He knew that the Cloudsoaring sect and the Spiritual Treasure sect’s disciples must be rushing towards the volcano area at maximum speed. They couldn’t be here.

What were approaching him must be either disciples of the Ghost sect or the Blood sect, or spirit beasts that roamed the desert.

The reason he released his psychic awareness was actually to determine the number of them, so that he could decide whether to flee at the first possible moment.

“There’s only one!”

In the next moment, he retracted his psychic awareness, and gradually rose to his feet in an unhurried manner.

THUMP! THUMP!

The sound of footsteps grew even louder. It seemed that the man wasn’t worried at all that Nie Tian might flee. Instead, he was trying to scare him with his imposing manner.

Nie Tian had a calm expression on his face. After he was sure that there was only one in the vicinity, not only did he stop worrying, he actually became quite excited.

Moments later, Du Kun appeared on top of a sand dune.

“Oh, it’s you!” he said, sounding a bit disappointed. “I can’t believe you didn’t run!”

As soon as Du Kun showed up, Nie Tian recognized him and grinned. “You again? There’s only one of you? What, you expected me to run or something? Where are the rest of your friends? Running to catch up?”

“The others?” Du Kun said, sneering. “Ha! Who do you think you are? You really think our entire group would change plans just to chase after a loser like you, someone who got kicked out of his group?”

“Fine,” Nie Tian said, clenching his fist. “Well now that you’re here, don’t even dream about leaving!”

And that was when Nie Tian attacked.