The Programmer Cultivator

He looked at the three who remained motionless and asked, "What’s this? Does no one want the Inheritance of a Three Talents Great Cultivator?"

Although Sha Xingping and Xue Su were both envious, the minor interruption of the earthquake had actually calmed them down. They weren’t about to lose their heads to temptation and act recklessly.

As for Zhang Deming and Li Shifan, it was even more unlikely that they would make a move.

Qu Hua suddenly sighed. "Alas, I was hoping you all would fight over it. That would have saved me some effort."

"Who knew the people I found this time would be so shortsighted? They can’t even tell the difference between a regular Inheritance and a Spirit Nurturing Inheritance."

"It forced me to speak up, completely shattering the sickly persona I’d built up."

"I did my best to stir up conflict along the way, but somehow we made it here in perfect harmony. It’s truly bizarre."

"Looks like I won’t be able to slack off today after all."

As he spoke, his severed arm grew back with startling speed.

"COUGH COUGH..."

He bent over and coughed a few times.

As he coughed up blood, Sha Xingping’s face abruptly flushed red. He spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with internal organs.

His body went rigid, and just like that, he died without any chance to resist, a look of confusion and indignation on his face.

"My Spirit Stones aren’t so easy to take."

"Besides, those of the Transformation System Bloodline are the most resilient and hardest to deal with, so I decided to take care of you first." Qu Hua said coldly, looking down at Sha Xingping’s corpse.

Witnessing this sudden turn of events, Xue Su instantly realized something was wrong. His entire body tensed, and he immediately moved to stand with Zhang Deming.

"COUGH COUGH..." After Sha Xingping’s death, Qu Hua continued to cough, spitting up bits of his own organs.

He spread the viscera out in his palm and then ate it again. It seemed his body genuinely was in bad shape; his earlier weakness hadn’t been a complete act.

"Looks like I’m running out of time. I need to hurry." As Qu Hua spoke, the aura around his body began to intensify.

In an instant, it surpassed that of an Apprentice, reaching the level of a Tai Chi Cultivator, and it still wasn’t stopping.

How could Xue Su see this and not know there was a problem?

"Number Three, now!"

He was no longer holding back and roared out Zhang Deming’s codename.

Well... what he *thought* was his codename.

He did this to reveal their affiliation, allowing them to fight for their lives without reservation and strengthening their trust in each other.

After speaking, the aura around him also began to grow. His face flushed red as he barely managed to emit the powerful fluctuations of a Tai Chi Cultivator.

He crossed his arms over his chest and uttered a Spell in a style completely different from that of the Hongmeng Realm.

He chanted in a low voice, "Oh, infinite Spirit of knowledge, please heed my call;"

"Let the language of knowledge decipher the world;"

"Let the touch of knowledge feel the world;"

"Let the wise eye of knowledge perceive the world;"

"First Ring of Knowledge: Source Code Insight!"

As Xue Su spoke, countless Runes flowed within his eyes. A stream of light composed of innumerable Runes shot out from them, heading straight for the space between Qu Hua’s eyebrows.

Black mist surged around Qu Hua, and a massive, humanoid black shadow appeared behind him like a Spirit.

The black shadow snatched the stream of Runes from the air and, with a gentle squeeze, shattered it into a shower of runic fragments that fell to the ground.

"A Technique from the Outer Realm? So there’s a Foreigner here this time?"

"Perfect. If it weren’t for you people from the Outer Realm, the Ancestor would have succeeded long ago. Why else would it have been delayed until now?"

Qu Hua turned and glanced at the metallic spots on the hand of the middle-aged man on the circular platform, his voice filled with hatred.

At that moment, a figure floated out in front of Li Shifan. With a light tap of a paintbrush in its hand, a dot of Spiritual Light at the tip sketched out countless Spiritual Power Swords.

"Painting Techniques: Ten Thousand Swords Technique!"

Sensing the powerful aura, Qu Hua frowned slightly. "Oh? So there was another one hiding. That explains why I kept feeling like I was being watched."

He spoke casually, but faced with the dense swarm of Spirit Swords, he raised his hand with great seriousness.

The spectral figure behind him mirrored his movement, raising its own hand.

"Heh, weren’t you playing the part of a seriously injured man? I think that part about your body was a rather genuine performance, wasn’t it?" Zhang Deming said with a smile, raising his hand.

As Zhang Deming spoke, Qu Hua abruptly froze. A faint stream of water suddenly appeared inside his body.

’Tier Two Mixed Technique: Spirit Water Technique Enhanced.’

"What? When did you plant this?" Qu Hua’s expression stiffened, his Technique instantly interrupted.

Zhang Deming chuckled. "Well, it’s not that your acting was bad!"

"It’s just that I’m a very cautious person. So back at the lake, I saved my one and only chance to strike for you."

"After all, you’re a seriously injured man. You require special attention. Otherwise, I would have been too worried to relax."

While Zhang Deming was speaking, Qu Hua had already opened his mouth and spat out a spirited, bloody stream of water.

And because of this delay, the countless Spirit Swords had already taken form.

They shot toward Qu Hua like a downpour of rain.

But Zhang Deming paid no attention to the outcome. With a casual gesture, the spirited stream of water that had been spat onto the ground appeared in his hand.

The water swirled, revealing a half-clump of black smoke—it was none other than the Wandering Soul Mist the other man had swallowed earlier.

’Since I’ve already made my move, I might as well be thorough and leave no room for recovery.’

’Although it seems this person is already a Tai Chi Cultivator and doesn’t need to advance...’

’...when we were dividing the items, his reaction didn’t suggest he was uninterested. On the contrary, he seemed particularly interested in this Wandering Soul Mist.’

’That being the case, now that I have the chance, I can’t let him get what he wants.’

Looking at the small clump of Wandering Soul Mist he had extracted, Zhang Deming enveloped it in Spiritual Power and casually tossed it into his bag.

At the same time, a Spiritual Power Vine shot out and snatched Sha Xingping’s bag. All of this was completed in a flash.

Just then, Li Shifan had just put away his Scroll. His face was pale and his body was weak, as if he had been drained dry by the Li Family Ancestor once again.

The Spirit Swords in the sky were still raining down.

Zhang Deming scooped Li Shifan up with one arm and, without waiting to see the result of the attack, turned and flashed to the spot the Li Family Ancestor had mentioned.

He activated his Spiritual Power and vanished from the attic in an instant.

Xue Su was stunned for a moment, but he quickly followed, entering the Array and departing as well.

After the barrage of Spirit Swords ended, the black shadow protecting Qu Hua was left tattered and broken. Qu Hua had been unable to cast his own Technique due to Zhang Deming’s sudden interference.

"COUGH COUGH..."

Qu Hua coughed up a large amount of blood again, mixed with bits of his internal organs.

He swallowed the viscera back down.

He stared at the spot where the three had vanished, his face contorted in a furious rage.

"I don’t care who you are, I’ll remember this!"

With that, the black mist behind him condensed back into a humanoid shape, though it looked somewhat damaged compared to before.

The black shadow grabbed Sha Xingping’s corpse from the floor, brought it before the middle-aged man’s light barrier, and crushed it into a gory paste.

The paste flowed onto the Light Screen and slowly vanished, causing the screen to become a bit more vibrant.

After doing this, Qu Hua looked around at the various Light Screens with extreme anger and said, "Just you wait! When the Ancestor gets out, not one of the people who sealed him away will escape!"

「...」

After scooping up Li Shifan and activating the escape Array, Zhang Deming once again found himself in a daze.

When he came to his senses, his body was tense, and he quickly scanned his surroundings.

He had already left the attic, and even the Secret Realm itself. He was now in a stretch of ruins within the Hengduan Mountain Range.

He was halfway up a mountain peak, surrounded by crumbling walls, overgrown with weeds and trees.

These dilapidated walls were so weathered they were barely recognizable, looking as if they had endured countless years. The place felt utterly desolate.

What surprised Zhang Deming the most was that the entire mountain peak seemed to be covered by a huge Array that possessed a certain Concealment effect, and it was still active.

"This place must have been an outer stronghold for the family or Sect from inside the Secret Realm, right?" Li Shifan asked, his voice weak with exhaustion.

Hearing his voice, Zhang Deming realized he was still carrying Li Shifan under his arm. He dropped the man to the ground and continued to survey the area.

After a moment, Zhang Deming finally spoke. "When I was leaving, I saw the other guy running right behind me, but he hasn’t shown up yet. It looks like there’s more than one exit like this."