Battle Through the Heaven: Purple Heaven

Xiao Xun'er watched Xiao Bai's figure fade into the distance, her expression turning icy as she transmitted, "Ling Lao, as I instructed last night, protect him well. If anything happens to him, don't bother coming back."

Though Xiao Bai seemed to trust the old man, she wasn't at ease.

In the distant shadows, Ling Ying's heart sank. This was the second time he'd heard those words—the first was from the clan leader when Xiao Xun'er came to the Xiao Clan. "Yes, Miss," he replied.

"Xiao Bai, keep your lightning in check. Don't let it zap me!" Yao Lao cautioned from the ring as Xiao Bai slipped it on.

Xiao Bai's eyes narrowed. Yao Lao's tone suggested he feared his lightning, but Xiao Bai was certain he'd never struck the old man with it. "Senior, my lightning's weak. It shouldn't harm you, right?" he probed.

"Hmph! Don't play dumb. If you hadn't hit me with that bolt years ago, knocking me out for two months, how could Xiao Yan have broken through to two-star Dou Zhe?" Yao Lao grumbled.

Xiao Bai's mind raced. So there's a story. It must've been when he'd disciplined Xiao Yan the second time. He'd sensed Yao Lao spying then, but when the old man went silent, he'd let it slide. Looks like the talisman acted. Yao Lao was lucky—spared annihilation, likely because the talisman sensed no malice, only issuing a warning.

"Where are we headed, kid? You can tell me now," Yao Lao pressed, still irked. This sly fox refused to spill the destination until we left.

"Magical Beast Mountain Range," Xiao Bai replied.

"The Magical Beast Mountain Range? Is there a Heavenly Flame there?" Yao Lao asked, surprised.

"Nope."

"Then why go? You're not messing with me, are you?" Yao Lao sounded skeptical but not angry.

"To pick up something before we hunt for the Heavenly Flame," Xiao Bai said calmly.

He needed the flight Dou Technique from that cave in the mountains. Traveling the desert on foot to find the Heavenly Flame would be too slow. He just hoped Xiao Yi Xian had the map; otherwise, he'd be scouring every cliff in the range's outskirts.

"What's this 'something'? I'm curious. You've never left Wu Tan City, so how do you know so much?" Yao Lao's surprise deepened. Xiao Bai had grown up under his watch, yet he seemed to know the outside world intimately. Compared to him, Xiao Yan felt like a typical Wu Tan City kid. Does this kid have someone like me guiding him?

But after months of observation, Xiao Bai seemed ignorant of things any powerhouse would consider common knowledge, making that theory unlikely.

"No big secret," Xiao Bai said. "I read a lot as a kid and loved hearing stories. When I was young, I met a strange man in Wu Tan City called Tian Can Zi. He told me tales of the Dou Qi Continent, so I know a bit more than most."

Spending so much time with Yao Lao, Xiao Bai saw no point in hiding everything. This explanation was perfect—vague enough to cover anything, and close enough to the truth. He believed it, whether Yao Lao did or not.

"Oh? Wu Tan City had someone like that?" Yao Lao didn't doubt him. The world had plenty of eccentric powerhouses. In his prime, he'd met many with odd quirks.

"Sure did! Wu Tan City's special, I've noticed. There was Tian Can Zi back then, now you, Senior. Who knows who'll show up next, right?" Xiao Bai said with a calm smile, half-teasing, half-serious.

Yao Lao pondered. He's got a point. Besides himself and this Tian Can Zi, the Xiao Clan alone had Xiao Bai and that extraordinary girl. Tch, who'd have thought a backwater city in the northwest would have such fortune?

"Wait, you didn't answer—what are we picking up in the mountains?" Yao Lao realized Xiao Bai had dodged the question.

Xiao Bai sighed inwardly. Why's Yao Lao so chatty today? Menopause? "To handle a senior's final affairs and collect a reward," he said vaguely.

"You're not grave-robbing, are you?" Yao Lao asked after a pause, suspicious.

"What's that talk, Senior? I'm ensuring a senior doesn't lie exposed in the wild, giving them a proper rest. Besides, can you say you've never entered a powerhouse's tomb or cave for their treasures?" Xiao Bai shot back.

Yao Lao's Flame Mantra and the method to control the Calamity Poison Body likely came from such ventures.

"I'm not judging," Yao Lao clarified. "Just want to know the guy's cultivation level when alive, so we don't get in over our heads."

On the Dou Qi Continent, only the ancient eight clans with their vast legacies frowned on tomb-raiding. Most powerhouses accepted it as part of the game, even setting up traps in their resting places knowingly.

Yao Lao had dismissed this region before, but Tian Can Zi's mention made him wary. As a soul, he couldn't risk Xiao Bai acting on faulty info and stumbling into a Dou Zun's tomb. His and Xiao Bai's past experiences taught him that powerhouses guarded their posthumous peace fiercely, rigging their resting places with deadly obstacles. A Dou Zun's tomb would be too much for a weakened soul and a young cultivator.

Xiao Bai realized he'd misunderstood, his reaction colored by his past life's view of grave-robbing as illegal and dishonorable. Plus, the mention always brought to mind a certain shameless fatty. "Relax, Senior. The guy was at most a Dou Huang. No threat to us," he reassured, a bit exasperated.

Man, Yao Lao's cautious now. Former Starfall Pavilion Master, peak Dou Zun—shouldn't he scoff at a place like the Jia Ma Empire?

Chatting with the unusually talkative Yao Lao, Xiao Bai traveled onward, the banter keeping things lively. They swapped stories—one rich with experience, the other armed with novel knowledge—though it was mostly empty boasting.

Three days later, the small town at the foot of the Magical Beast Mountain Range came into view.

Qingshan Town, arrived!