After three days of tense travel, the group finally reached Wanyuo City. The first thing they did was rent a small courtyard, each person claiming a room to rest and recover.
Once Yunxi activated the isolation array in her room, she took out her own formation disk and set it in place. During her time outside the sect, this disk had been her most-used tool, giving her firsthand appreciation of how vital high-grade formation tools were.
She decided that once she returned to the sect, she'd start learning how to inscribe formation disks. The Dao of formations was vast and deep—when used well, it could rival a thousand-strong army.
Dian Dian finally poked his head out from her arms, his little nose twitching. Then he sent her a voice transmission.
"Master, after you fought that bad thing, it left a mark on you."
Yunxi froze, her hand still sorting spirit stones. She immediately pulled Dian Dian out of her arms.
"Dian Dian, did you smell something?"
His black ears twitched as his small head gave a serious nod.
"Yes, Master. And it smells awful."
He sniffed again in disgust.
"Can you tell where the mark is?"
Dian Dian motioned to be set down. Once on the floor, he trotted in a circle around Yunxi before pointing a paw at her boots.
"Master, it's here."
Yunxi swept her spiritual sense over the spot and immediately noticed a tiny black dot, no bigger than a mung bean, stuck to the sole of her boot. Without a deliberate scan, it was nearly impossible to detect. Even if someone saw it, they probably wouldn't care—unless they floated instead of walking.
"What rotten luck."
Yunxi shot to her feet, stuffed Dian Dian back into her arms, and left the courtyard alone, heading straight for the Treasured Pavilion in Wanyuo City.
As soon as a shop attendant came up to her, Yunxi said, "I want to buy a pair of enchanted boots."
"Please, Daoyou, come this way."
The attendant smiled and led her to a private chamber. A moment later, he returned with three pairs of boots held in his arms.
"These are the ones best suited to you within the Treasured Pavilion."
He began to introduce them one by one, from appearance to crafting materials, to spiritual properties. He even helpfully noted the minor flaws of each pair.
Yunxi was drawn to the Ruyi Boots, made from ghostface spider silk. In addition to the basics like dust-repelling and resistance to water and fire, this pair could also change color to match its owner's robes and provided a modest twenty percent speed boost. The only drawback was that the design was extremely plain, the most basic women's style with no decorations at all.
"Don't be fooled by how ordinary these boots look, Daoyou. Their value is excellent. They go with any set of robes and are very practical. For cultivators, these things are just tools—no need to get flashy."
The attendant clearly knew how to sell, and his pitch hit the mark. Yunxi had been hoping for something low-key, and these boots fit her requirements perfectly. After confirming the price, she spent two thousand lower-grade spirit stones, taken from the evil cultivators' storage pouches, and changed into the new boots on the spot. She waved off the attendant, telling him to discard the old pair.
Her previous boots had been issued by the sect and only had dust-repelling properties, so she didn't mind tossing them. What mattered now was removing the mark.
After adjusting her new boots to a light gray shade to match her robes, she returned to the courtyard. She had Dian Dian sniff her over again. Once he confirmed the scent was gone, she finally relaxed.
"Dian Dian, only Senior Sister Mu and I left the formation that time. Was that when the mark was planted?"
"Probably."
"These evil cultivators really have some twisted methods," Yunxi muttered with a frown.
"Master, you should have me sniff that Senior Sister Mu tomorrow too. What if she's been marked as well? You all traveled together, so even if you removed your mark, the bad guys could still find you."
Dian Dian's tail swished as he spoke.
"You're right. No harm in being cautious. But I think those two from Baihua Tower are in even greater danger."
Yunxi suspected that Yu Qingcheng and Liu Haotian had a much higher chance of being marked. They'd been fighting evil cultivators constantly, and Liu Haotian had even been injured by one, making it easier for them to track him.
Though she wasn't close to them, they were still righteous cultivators. She decided to send Yu Qingcheng a transmission talisman as a warning. Whether the other party believed it or not was out of her hands.
When Yu Qingcheng received the message, she froze in surprise. She hadn't expected Yunxi to contact her so soon after parting. But after listening to the message's contents, her expression changed. She immediately knocked on her Senior Brother's door.
Liu Haotian had just expelled the last trace of demonic qi from his face and was refining a spiritual replenishment pill. When the array was triggered, he stopped his meditation and opened the door to see his clearly distressed junior sister.
"Junior Sister Yu, what's wrong?"
"Senior Brother Liu, we need to leave Wanyuo City immediately. We should use the teleportation array and return to Baihua Tower. We might have been marked by evil cultivators."
"What? But I've already expelled the demonic qi," Liu Haotian said, frowning.
"A cultivator from Haoran Sect sent me a warning. She said the sole of her boot had been marked by evil cultivators. If it weren't for her spirit beast's nose, she wouldn't have noticed it herself."
"The sole of her boot?"
Liu Haotian instinctively raised his foot and swept it with his spiritual sense, but found nothing unusual.
Yu Qingcheng said solemnly, "Senior Brother, evil cultivators are sly. We fought them for days. Do you really think they wouldn't try something?
Remember when we used those random-direction teleportation talismans to escape, but they still found us the very next day? That wasn't coincidence.
And the ones chasing us kept getting stronger. By the end, they were all late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators. They weren't trying to kill us—they wanted to take us alive."
Liu Haotian's expression grew grim. He trusted his junior sister. Without her protection, he would've already been captured. So he didn't hesitate.
"Let's go now."
After checking out of their inn, the two of them made their way to Wanyuo City's teleportation hall. The city was close to the Baohua Mountains, so the local cities were all equipped with teleportation arrays. Since the anomaly at Baohua Mountains, many cultivators had flocked to the area, and the arrays had been extremely busy. Though the crowd had eased somewhat, there were still many incoming cultivators.
However, far fewer were leaving, so Yu Qingcheng and Liu Haotian didn't have to wait long. They paid the spirit stones and teleported to the city closest to Baihua Tower.
Shortly after the two of them vanished, two black-robed cultivators arrived at the teleportation hall—but they were too late.
"They slipped away."
"Xue Ao said they had backup, but he marked them. Should we keep chasing?"
The other paused before replying.
"The one guarding them is a Nascent Soul cultivator. We shouldn't expose ourselves. As long as that little disciple continues her training outside, we'll find her again."
"Understood."
The second one looked frustrated. Their prey had slipped through their fingers, and three late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators had died for nothing. Just thinking about it was infuriating.
In the end, both left the teleportation hall with dark expressions.
Meanwhile, Yunxi had already paid a visit to Mu Ningzhu with Dian Dian in tow. They did, in fact, discover a mark on her too.
This time, the mark had been left in her hair.
Mu Ningzhu's face turned green with rage.