霎时间, the crystal walls surrounding them began to violently shake under the impact of a rampaging power, emitting deafening roars.

The six giant snow toads, towering like mountains around them, also trembled. Though their massive forms didn't move, black blood seeped from their six pairs of enormous eyes, and their auras rapidly weakened.

Before the tremors could subside, several draconic roars echoed within the crystal walls.

Immediately afterward, within the still-lingering darkness, a blinding blaze erupted. Three hundred-foot-long fire dragons, formed from crimson flames, burst forth, their mouths spewing roaring flames as they lunged toward the crystal walls laced with black veins.

With a loud "Boom!"

The black crystal walls shuddered violently, and plumes of black smoke instantly rose from their surface, rapidly dissolving.

The sound of "Sizzle, sizzle" filled the night sky as the three crimson fire dragons eroded a large hole in the black crystal walls. They shot out, weaving and intertwining into a surging river of blood-flame, and then cascaded back toward the soft-featured man and the obese man.

The obese man had already flown back to the top of the Golden-Eyed Snow Toad. Seeing the array broken, both men's expressions drastically changed, and they rapidly performed hand seals in unison.

The next moment, all six snow toads opened their mouths at the same time, spewing out a large expanse of black frigid air, which condensed into a wall of ice in mid-air, meeting the river of blood-flame head-on.

Han Li, meanwhile, had flown out of the edge of the crystal wall with a sway of his body. His clothes were tattered, and he looked somewhat disheveled, but in reality, only his internal organs had suffered some tremors, and he was mostly unharmed.

He looked up at the raging river of blood-flame, a complex expression flashing in his eyes.

The river of blood-flame was not composed of pure fire-attribute law power, but also mixed with a blood-attribute law power. The aura it exuded was vaguely similar to that of the Red Moon Island Lord, who had fallen earlier.

He shifted his gaze and saw that Gan Jiuzhen's clothes were also torn in several places, revealing large patches of her fair, jade-like skin. The red veil on her face was long gone, and her cold and beautiful face showed a hint of paleness.

Her eyes held no trace of tenderness, only a chilling killing intent. The square jade pendant she held tightly in her hand shone brightly, its runes flashing erratically, though the crimson color on it had faded quite a bit.

At this point, Han Li was almost certain that this woman was Jiao San.

After he left Red Moon Island, Jiao San claimed that she still had some cleanup to do, which probably included searching for any treasures left behind by Gongshu Hong.

"Puff, puff, puff..."

Sounds continued to reverberate in the high sky, and large patches of black mist constantly rose from the intersection of ice and fire, obscuring half the sky like dark clouds.

The soft-featured man and the obese man no longer had the relaxed appearance they had shown earlier.

Their cultivations were not as high as Gan Jiuzhen's, and their greatest reliance, the Six Toad Fire Fusion Formation, had been suddenly broken. Now, they exchanged glances, and both saw a hint of retreat in each other's eyes.

The other three snow toads had also been summoned back to them. However, the frigid air spewed by the six exotic beasts standing side by side could only barely withstand the blood-flame's invasive force.

Seeing this, Gan Jiuzhen coldly snorted, opened her mouth, and spat out a mouthful of vital blood, making her face even paler.

She quickly pointed her finger, and the mouthful of vital blood twisted and deformed into a miniature dragon, disappearing into the jade pendant in a flash.

Immediately afterward, another draconic roar resounded.

The blood light on the jade pendant intensified, and a fourth crimson-flame blood dragon soared out of it. At once, it plunged into the river of blood-flame, causing the rolling flames to surge violently, its momentum even greater than before.

Correspondingly, the color of the jade pendant faded even more.

As a red light burst forth in mid-air, transforming into a sea of raging crimson flames, a heart-palpitating aura spread out.

The soft-featured man and the obese man felt their heartbeats suddenly accelerate, and the blood in their veins seemed to rush wildly out of control.

The two men were startled and hurriedly diverted a portion of their immortal spiritual power to stabilize their minds. With the two men no longer providing immortal spiritual power, the snow toads' frigid air spewing weakened.

As the opposing forces shifted, the rolling blood-flame, with its greater momentum, immediately flipped over and pressed down, instantly engulfing the snow toads and the two men.

Two screams of agony then came from within the blood-flame.

Within the blood-flame, the light of magic treasures occasionally flashed, but they only flickered once before disappearing without a sound.

Han Li, at this moment, had just put away his nine white flying swords. Then, he swept his palm in the void, and wisps of immortal spiritual power meandered from his fingertips, beginning to slowly collect the heavy water dust that had scattered around after the heavy water pattern thunder exploded.

After a moment, there was finally no movement within the blood-flame.

Gan Jiuzhen formed a strange hand seal with one hand and waved it forward. The rolling blood-flame immediately transformed into four blood dragons, soaring into the sky and flying back into the jade pendant in her hand, disappearing without a trace.

In mid-air, only two battered corpses remained, falling helplessly toward the ground.

As for the snow toads, though they were exotic beasts, their physical bodies were not as strong as those of immortals and were refined into nothing but ashes.

After taking several pills, Gan Jiuzhen reached out and summoned the two storage bracelets that flew through the air, falling into her hand.

Without even looking at them, she directly threw one of them to Han Li.

Han Li didn't hesitate and reached out to catch it directly.

"Fellow Daoist Liu, ever since you took action just now, I've had a question. Before we traveled together this time, have we ever met anywhere?" Gan Jiuzhen looked at Han Li with a hint of scrutiny and asked.

"Fellow Daoist is so beautiful that if I had seen you, I would definitely remember it vividly, but I don't recall having any past interactions with you," Han Li replied calmly, his expression unchanged.

Hearing this, Gan Jiuzhen narrowed her beautiful eyes slightly, obviously not believing much of Han Li's words.

However, she didn't continue to press the issue and slowly said:

"In any case, you have done me a favor today. And I, Gan Jiuzhen, never want to owe anyone a favor in this life. This Azure Wind Immortal-Locking Talisman will be my thank you gift."

With that, she flicked her wrist, and a purple spirit talisman flew out of her sleeve, drifting toward Han Li.

Han Li raised his hand and grabbed the talisman. He scanned it and saw that the spirit talisman was densely covered with mysterious silver patterns, clearly a high-level talisman written in Silver蝌蚪 script.

Its spiritual power was full, leaping on the paper, and its grade seemed to be even higher than the Taiyi Transformation Talisman and the Primal Armor Talisman.

"Then thank you, Fellow Daoist Gan." Han Li cupped his fist slightly, put away the talisman, and planned to study it carefully when he had time.

"I can ignore the matter of secretly following me earlier, but if there is a next time, don't blame me for being ruthless." Seeing this, the woman in the red dress didn't say more. After leaving this sentence, she turned around and left cleanly.

Han Li looked in the direction where the woman's figure disappeared, a wry smile on his face. Then, without lingering any longer, he flew back in the direction he had come from.

Before long, he returned to where the flying boat was located.

The location of the battle was very far away. No one here on the flying boat had noticed anything. The two Nascent Soul cultivators from the Chengquan Trading Company were still sitting on the deck at the front of the flying boat, one on the left and one on the right.

Han Li's figure swayed and instantly transformed into a wisp of nothingness, quietly returning to his room on the boat.

The night passed in the blink of an eye.

The next day, just as dawn broke, the flying boat set off.

The disappearance of the woman in the red dress, Gan Jiuzhen, was naturally discovered by the Kou-named man not long after.

Apart from Han Li, no one else on the flying boat knew what had happened that night. Han Li naturally didn't reveal what had happened that night and just pretended not to know.

Although the Kou-named man was somewhat puzzled, there was nothing he could do. After all, they hadn't reached their destination, and he hadn't paid the reward yet. In the end, he had let the other party escort him for a considerable distance for nothing, so he didn't lose out.

Unlike the Misty Burial Forest, this black rock desert was desolate, without a single living creature in sight.

The white flying boat increased its speed to the maximum. It didn't even use the white mist restriction for camouflage, and all the spiritual power was concentrated on speed.

The flying boat transformed into a white shadow, flying forward extremely fast.

Although there were no signs of monster attacks around, Han Li, at the Kou-named man's request, joined the other two Nascent Soul stage protectors in guarding various parts of the flying boat.

Half a day passed quickly, and the flying boat gradually entered the depths of the Black Rock Desert.

Han Li stood on one side of the flying boat, looking down.

Just now, he had clearly sensed that the gravity from the ground below had begun to increase.

Although the white flying boat was also affected to some extent, the white light on it began to flicker erratically, resisting the pull of gravity, and its speed also decreased somewhat.

Han Li pondered slightly, and his immense spiritual sense spread out, sinking hundreds of feet into the ground.

"It really is an extremely rich mineral deposit. There are also many yuan magnetic black iron mines inside, no wonder it can produce such a strong gravitational pull..." he murmured to himself in surprise.

In addition, he didn't discover any dark beasts lurking within a hundred feet underground, unless they were hiding deeper underground.

Han Li's mind stirred, and his spiritual sense continued to spread deeper.

The next moment, a hint of surprise flashed in his eyes.

Due to the underground mineral veins, the deeper he went, the more chaotic the various underground yuan energy and gravity intertwined together, actually blocking his spiritual sense from continuing to penetrate deeper.

Seeing this, he didn't forcibly probe but instead spread his spiritual sense around.

"Eh!"

Before long, Han Li suddenly looked up ahead, a soft exclamation escaping his lips.

However, after thinking about it, he didn't make a sound, but his eyes flickered with blue light.

A moment later, one of the Nascent Soul protectors on the other side of the flying boat's expression shifted, and he stood up abruptly.

In his spiritual sense perception, some black lizards had appeared in front of them.

This person had been here many times and was somewhat familiar with the Black Rock Desert. He immediately recognized that this was a common type of dark beast in the Black Rock Desert, called the "Black-Backed Iron Lizard." Their entire bodies were tougher than steel, but their strength wasn't that great. The ones that appeared in front of them were only around the Foundation Establishment stage.

The only thing he was worried about was that these iron lizards were social demonic beasts, and their numbers were often in the hundreds of millions. If they were to encounter them carelessly, it would be very troublesome.

And as far as he knew, these iron lizards shouldn't be active during the day.