Tainted will

With the lightning qi stone in one hand and the scarlet qi stone in the other, Bai Ming started to draw in both of their energies.

The birthing of an element was a delicate practice and required a certain level of comprehensive ability, it also contained a high-level requirement for innate talent too.

Bai Ming then drummed up his own innate elemental energies to direct both energies to clash. With their battle, his body felt like it was going to detonate, but the energies had guidance and thus were less destructive. He was pitting two mammoths together instead of handling one.

With each smashing clash, bits of lightning energy and scarlet qi defected from the primary source. He drew in the enclosing spiritual energy, refined it, mixed it in with the three forms of energy, and sent them to his spirit base to be crushed and absorbed.

After several days, a delicate yet explosive equilibrium was reached. Soon, Bai Ming felt the scarlet elemental essence in his spirit base starting to strengthen the water, earth, fire, wood, and wind energies with miraculous means.

Bai Ming took a deep breath and exhaled. The surrounding energy rippled and the strands of scarlet energy beneath his feet wiggled wildly. He opened his eyes to reveal myriad images flashing within. Each image was illusory but possessed a potent source of vitality.

"Scarlet elemental essence is truly a blessing!" Bai Ming then stretched out his palms. In his right palm, slivers of lightning and golden mist flowed endlessly. They danced like companions of the night in perfect harmony.

In his left palm were the five natural elements of the world: fire, water, earth, wood, and wind. A thin layer of Scarlet essence was warped around them. These elements existed in an even greater balance and flow as of now.

'Now, I have birthed three unique elements in my spirit base; Gold, Scarlet, and thunder essence. I knew birthing Scarlet essence was a good idea, but it turned out even better. The five base elements have each undergone natural modification due to the addition of Scarlet essence and have become two times more powerful than before.' Bai Ming evaluated as he scrutinized his spirit base.

'I have already reached the pinnacle of the spirit realm and my body cultivation has also reached the 8th layer of the Yin-Yang void realm, currently, I have even birthed two more unique elements. And I have accomplished all of this merely within two months. He-He-He, I have to thank Teng Zhe for this opportunity.' Bai Ming snickered internally, living off of someone else's expenses gave him great satisfaction.

'The next step should be to learn the soul path skills and techniques that I have brought earlier. But before that, I should contact that woman.' Bai Ming retrieved a piece of transmission jade slip from his storage bag. Next, he sent a message using it instructing Dong Mei to immediately meet him.

During these two months of seclusion, Bai Ming never left his room. But he had met Dong Mei once twenty days ago to gather new bits and pieces of information regarding the Red Lotus sect. And he also wanted her to buy a set of formation flags, he was going to start accumulating sect points by trading tier-4 formations.

After instructing her, Bai Ming didn't waste time. He took out the three soul path techniques he had purchased from the Lotus treasure pavilion. The jade on top had the words 'Concealed Soul dagger' written on it, this was an offensive soul path technique.

Upon comprehending this mid-grade soul path technique, one could transform their soul force into a soul dagger, which could directly assault an opponent's soul and destroy it. Without a defensive soul technique or treasures, the individual under attack would have their soul shattered.

Don't look down on this technique because it's only a mid-grade technique, even in the whole of the Red lotus sect the number of soul path skills doesn't exceed fifteen including a single high-grade soul path technique, which Bai Ming didn't have the right to learn as of now according to the sect rules.

Soul path techniques were just that rare and precious.

Even with this mid-grade soul technique, Bai Ming could instantly kill a person in the same realm as long as that said individual hasn't learnt any soul path offensive or defensive skills.

Next was the mid-grade technique Wisdom soul wall, which was a soul path defensive technique that creates an exceptionally formidable soul wall around one's soul safeguarding the soul from external attacks.

Finally, we have the soul search technique. It is an extremely popular technique in the whole of Planet Azure. It was not wrong to say that all the great experts in this world knew this technique. As the name suggests, after comprehending this skill one could dig through the memories stored in a soul, be it a human soul or a demon beast soul.

'Even with my comprehensive capabilities, I'll need around four days to comprehend them. After all, the soul is the most mysterious part of the human body and my understanding is lacking in that aspect.' Bai Ming contemplated for a moment before he carefully began reading the Concealed soul dagger technique, with his forceful nature it was only natural for him to initiate learning from an offensive technique.

Ten minutes later, Bai Ming retracted his gaze from the jade and glanced at the wooden door, the restrictions which he had placed outside had just alerted him. Bai Ming closed his eyes and sensed the divine sense imprint he had placed on Dong Mei, with its help Bai Ming was able to confirm that the person outside was none other than her.

The divine sense marker which he had placed on her was enough to know her location as long as she was within Bai Ming's thirty-mile radius.

Bai Ming then used his peak spirit realm divine sense to scan the area around his residence, only then did Bai Ming feel a slight sense of security.

With a wave of his hand, the obstructing restrictions and arrays immediately made way for her. As Bai Ming coldly glared at the door awaiting Dong Mei's entry.

Light footsteps could be heard at the door followed by a Soft knocking that resounded from outside, "Senior brother, it's Dong Mei. I have come just as you had instructed."

Bai Ming willed and all the restrictions behind Dong Mei closed immediately, he spoke in a cold and detached voice, "Enter"

Creek.

The door was slowly opened, exposing a gap as sunlight infiltrated from the gap.

The gap gradually enlarged.

Bai Ming didn't know why, but he felt a feeling of unease growing in his heart.

His sharp gaze fixedly stared at the entrance, at the same time his grasp on the sword subconsciously tightened.

What he saw first was a hand on the door.

A female's smooth and slender arm came into his vision first as the door opened fully.

Then her entire body quickly followed after.

Catching sight of this Bai Ming took a deep breath as he finally relaxed momentarily.

The instant he loosened up the walls enclosing him explosively shattered into fragments.

Before Bai Ming could even get a good sense of his assailants, two shadows appeared behind him like the looming dread of death.

Time seemed to have paused for Bai Ming, Despite him having a calm character Bai Ming couldn't help breaking out in cold sweat at this moment.

Bai Ming's eyes flashed with a fleeting light, he didn't have the time to turn around or press forward. His right-hand swiftly entered his pocket and quickly broke the defensive jade given to him by Teng Zhe.

Bai Ming's entire body was instantaneously enveloped in bright green light like he was wearing jade armor.

The shadows held sharp and sinister weapons, obviously capable of immense cutting power, they attempted to slice through the Jade armor, but shockingly found that they couldn't.

But the terrifying impact from the attack was enough to send Bai Ming flying like a ragged doll.

Had his reaction been just a bit late, Bai Ming would have ended up dead.

Bai Ming was about to crash against the wall, but a third shadow appeared before him, the shadow raised a saber high above its head, intending to hack down Bai Ming into two halves.

A chill suffused in Bai Ming's eyes, using the momentum from the previous attack Bai Ming forcefully twisted his body in mid-air and ferociously punched out using a fist technique.

The saber and fist clashed majestically resulting in a deafening bang, the impact caused the surrounding air to ripple violently. Dong Mei who was standing absentmindedly at the entrance was immediately sent flying from the resulting airwave.

"Ah!" The third shadow shrieked in pain, as he took a couple of steps back to compose himself.

"What!?" A voice sounded below Bai Ming in shock, Bai Ming's eyes immediately darted downwards but what greeted him was a golden palm on his chest.

Bam!

The shockwave from the strike spread inside jade armor into Bai Ming's body, making him spew out mouthfuls of fresh blood as he was directly sent soaring upwards, the roof exploded under the fierce impact of the collision.

Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!

Hundreds of swords materialized behind Bai Ming before repeatedly bombarding downwards resembling a breathtaking meteor shower.

Bai Ming openly reached out to Teng Zhe using the jade slip while lightly tapping on his storage bag and brought out a jar crammed with hundreds of spiritual cores and tossed it below.

"Wooden Star Gate!" A shadow made a hand sign and a towering wooden wall with golden markings immediately rose from the ground and closely protected them from the incoming attacks.

"Hmph, the information which the elder provided was inaccurate. His battle strength has already surpassed the Spirit realm and is on par with a Yin-Yang void realm martial artist. That punch earlier was enough to make my arm go numb."

"He has already contacted Elder Teng, we need to retreat now!"

The shadows conversed and immediately agreed on retreating. Their initial goal was to swiftly kill Bai Ming off without causing a commotion, but since things didn't proceed accordingly they immediately gave up on killing Bai Ming and settled on retreating.

It was a wise move, if they were going to persist in dragging this on, it would undoubtedly end in their demise once Teng Zhe arrives.

Swish! Swish! Swish! Swish!

The shadows instantly took flight and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

Bai Ming soundlessly hovered in the air while coldly staring at the fleeing figures, Bai Ming didn't give chase. The jade armor wasn't invincible and would break apart sooner or later. Secondly, he clearly lacked the strength to kill them off. Thirdly, he absolutely didn't dare take Yin-Yang void realm experts lightly.

"Sending four Yin-Yang experts just to deal with an insignificant Spirit Realm cultivator, how admirable." Bai Ming wiped the blood off his lips, his cold gaze then landed on the half-dead figure slowly crawling below.

"They must have invaded while I opened the formations for her, humans are nothing but trouble." Bai Ming sneered, then with just a mental command from him, Dong Mei's soul was instantly shattered.

Dong Mei let out a miserable cry before her eyes dimmed and her body became motionless.

One of the top five beauties of the inner sect, Dong Mei was dead just like that.

Bai Ming didn't even spare her corpse, with a wave of his hand a purple flame burnt both her body and belongings.

Even though Bai Ming had placed a set of restrictions on her, it was only able to destroy her soul and sense her location, it couldn't control her thoughts or actions, and this was an important shortcoming for Bai Ming. Making him determined enough to kill her.

As for obliterating her storage bag, it was because he didn't want to leave future problems if someone wanted to frame him, those very treasures would become a piece of evidence.