"DAMMIT!" howled the young woman. She was very beautiful, and her appearance before she had attacked just now was charming and gentle. However, her moves had been as explosive as a dragon.

Right now, her howl was filled with potent power, and an aura that seemed to proclaim that she was the most important person in the world. Seeing her like this caused Meng Hao's scalp to go numb; he had never before witnessed a woman behaving like this.

"DAMMIT!" she roared. She clenched her right hand into a fist and smashed it into the ground. There wasn't much ground left to begin with, and her blow caused it to crumble even further.

"Why couldn't it be black!?"

BOOM!

"Why couldn't it be red!?"

BAM!

"Why couldn't it be violet!?"

With every sentence, she violently slammed her fist down onto the ground around Meng Hao, causing the ground to begin to disintegrate. Soon, only the spot directly beneath his feet was left remaining.

The slamming fists even caused the nothingness around them to begin to collapse….

Meng Hao's scalp grew even more numb. This girl was crazy! Such bizarre power… really went beyond Meng Hao's imagination. He had the feeling that even though he was wearing the blood-colored mask, he still wasn't a match for this lunatic.

Suddenly, Meng Hao thought back to how Ji Hongdong had described this young woman, and suddenly completely agreed.

Seeing how she was smashing the nothingness into smithereens, Meng Hao quickly turned and sped off in a different direction into the nothingness. As he charged off, he heard the girl raging.

"Why did it have to be green!?"

BLAM!

His face pale, Meng Hao prepared to be teleported out of the nothingness. He looked down briefly at the back of his hand, and the mark, which was gradually fading.

"Could it really be because of this mark…." he thought, hesitating for a moment. Thinking back to the fearsomeness of the crazy young woman, he shuddered. From the time he was small until the time he grew up, from when he studied as a scholar to when he began to practice cultivation, this was the first time he had ever been this frightened of a woman.

Meng Hao's eyes began to grow hazy. When they cleared, he could see a black fog overhead, and could also sense a familiar aura. This… was the region of the Rebirth Cave.

Right now, the Immortal's corpse was rapidly shrinking. From the looks of it, it would very soon return to the size of a normal human.

People were currently being teleported out all over the place, in various positions. The instant Meng Hao appeared, he pulled out the good luck charm. It took only a moment to test it out, whereupon Meng Hao frowned. As he had anticipated, it wouldn't work.

Putting the good luck charm away, Meng Hao immediately shot off in the direction of the Rebirth Cave. Even before emerging, he had made up his mind. He knew that he would be stuck in this area, and as such, was dead without a doubt. There would be no way to flee.

His only chance of survival lay upon the path of death… the Rebirth Cave!

Such a path of death, in comparison to his current predicament, was a chance for survival!

He had no other options. It was a gamble, but he had thought through everything, and as such, charged forward immediately.

The instant he had teleported out, outside of the misty basin, by the more than ten pillars of light, the eyes of the middle-aged man from the Ji Clan suddenly opened.

"He's here!" he said, waving his right hand. Immediately, a glowing image appeared in front of him; it was none other than the fleeing Meng Hao. "He's heading north!" he said coolly, flickering off in pursuit. The Nascent Soul Elders of the Ji Clan followed him into the fog of the basin, their faces grim and filled with killing intent.

The dozen or so Li Clan Cultivators also flew into the air in quick succession, faces filled with killing intent as they went in pursuit of Meng Hao.

Any one of these people could kill Meng Hao with the wave of a finger. However, each and every one of them joined the chase; pursuing Meng Hao was a matter which all felt that they must participate in.

They entered the fog, but as they did, not a single one could sense the presence of the tenth Wang Clan Patriarch. He smiled as he also moved in the same direction. He was in plain sight, and yet no one noticed him as he joined them within the fog.

The Nascent Soul Cultivators of the Ji and Li Clans proceeded through the black fog, and as they did, their Cultivation bases were slowly suppressed. Soon, they were back within the great circle of the Core Formation stage.

Despite that, any one of them was powerful enough to immediately slay Meng Hao.

They moved onward with incredible speed. As for the middle-aged Spirit Severing Cultivator from the Ji Clan, his Cultivation base was even more suppressed. He could fight against it, but not for long. At the moment, his Cultivation base was at the Nascent Soul stage.

He was moving with the greatest speed through the fog. As he whistled through the air, suddenly, he heard a cough that sounded very ancient, coming from off to the side.

The cough was too sudden; it immediately caused the middle-aged man's face to flicker and stop moving temporarily.

"Who are you?!" he said, anxiety and doubt showing on his face. Even though his Cultivation base was suppressed, he was still a powerful Spirit Severing expert; his ability to sense danger had flashed as soon as he heard the cough. It transformed into a droning in his mind, and he had the feeling that the owner of the voice could kill him immediately if he so wished.

"Which member of the senior generation is here?" he asked, his scalp growing numb. He thought of the Rebirth Cave, and suddenly a sense of crisis filled him that caused him to begin to pant. "Sir, I am of the Ji Clan…."

"How is… Ji Eleven?" said the ancient voice, seemingly filled with emotion.

"The Eleventh Divine Patriarch…." The middle-aged man's mouth and throat immediately went dry, and his heart began to thump. Ji Eleven was a name that outsiders didn't know, the name of a person who was a member of a group of the most ancient members of the Ji Clan.

Any one of that group was an ancestor who the entire Ji Clan would prostrate in worship to.

"Sir… sir, I have never seen the Eleventh Divine Patriarch…." The man trembled; the seemingly imperceptible pressure coming from the owner of the ancient voice caused him to feel as if the entire world was about to fall apart.

"Very well," said the voice, drifting about like a breeze around the middle-aged man. "I won't cause too much trouble for you. Sit here and meditate for the time it takes an incense stick to burn. Then you may leave." The voice was filled with somberness. It caused the middle-aged man's face to instantly flicker. He hesitated for just a moment, then chose to sit down cross-legged.

The tenth Wang Clan Patriarch stood right in front of him, staring off into the black fog. However, the middle-aged man couldn't see him at all.

"Child, I've already delayed this person for you," he said softly to himself. "I've fixed your biggest problem for you. The rest of them are suppressed into the Core Formation, which means you still won't be able to escape. That, in turn, means that even if I help you get away, you'll still die on the outside. In that case, I may have no choice but to take your perfection away from you now.

"It's too bad. From time immemorial, it has never been possible to force perfection to develop. I'm not sure what power it was that caused the interference…. If it weren't for that, I could just grab you and let you grow in my custody. After you reached the Nascent Soul stage, then I could take it from you. Well, you'd better not let me down. You need to get powerful quickly, okay?" The old man's eyes flickered with a sinister glow. At this moment, he looked incredibly bizarre.

"Only 60 kilometers…." Meng Hao's eyes glowed brightly. The spot he had been teleported to was not very close to the Rebirth Cave. Normally speaking, such a distance would be nothing to him.

However, he was surrounded by danger on all sides. This distance of 60 kilometres represented either life or death.

He was currently moving at the fastest speed he possibly could.

55 kilometers, 52 kilometers, 50 kilometers…. Meng Hao could now see the shrinking corpse of the Immortal. He was about to fly over it when his expression suddenly changed.

A boom filled the air; multiple members of the various Sects suddenly appeared as they were teleported out into the fog, sending it roiling out in all directions. Their expressions flickered as they saw the group of old men speeding through the air after Meng Hao.

The group included Chen Fan, Han Bei, Chu Yuyan, Wang Youcai, Li Shiqi as well as… Xu Qing.

They saw what was happening; they saw the old men chasing, and they saw who they were chasing. Off in the distance was… Meng Hao!

Because the churning fog had suddenly dispersed, Meng Hao was completely visible. Everyone could see him; furthermore, he had no inclination to conceal his identity. All eyes were now fixed on him alone.

"Meng… Meng Hao!" said Chen Fan, staring in amazement. His mind spun as he gaped at Meng Hao. He had searched for him for years, but had never been able to pick up his tracks after the year he disappeared. How could he ever have anticipated that he would suddenly catch sight of Meng Hao here?

Chu Yuyan's face was pale, and her body trembled. She stared blankly at Meng Hao's garment. Her face filled with bitterness as she suddenly understood that… Fang Mu was Meng Hao!

He was the Cultivator from the State of Zhao with whom she had spent half a year stuck inside a ravine. It hit her like a bolt of lightning. In truth, that lightning bolt had begun brewing within the mental realm. She had even begun to prepare herself then; however, as of now, she couldn't control the emotions inside of her. Her heart surged with countless complexities.

There were two people in her life that she considered to be unforgettable. One was Meng Hao. She could never forget him because of the twisted feelings he caused that year in the volcano; those events had filled her with hatred she found difficult to put into words.

The second person she found to be unforgettable was Fang Mu. The instant she found out he was Pill Cauldron, she would find herself thinking about him, even though she didn't know why. Sometimes, his face would appear in her mind, and she would find herself giving a light snort, or occasionally, a slight smile. Other times, her face would grow red.

"Fang Mu…. Meng Hao…." Two faces appeared in her mind, overlapping. In the end, the only thing that remained was deep bitterness and complex emotions.

Wang Youcai looked silently at Meng Hao. His heart was calm, but deep inside, he recalled the scene from all those years ago in the cave of Mount Daqing. He remembered sticking his head out, looking up, and seeing Meng Hao the scholar.1

Li Shiqi looked at Meng Hao silently, thinking back to their battle years ago.

Han Bei sighed. She was clever and farsighted. The instant she saw the expression on Chu Yuyan's face, some clues as to their relationship suddenly appeared in her mind, although she had no way to completely solve the puzzle. Meng Hao, of course, had left her with a deep impression long ago. Her phoenix-like eyes gazed at him.

Meng Hao…. It was a name that hadn't appeared in the Southern Domain for a very long time. And yet, here he was, blazing as brilliantly as ever!

Fun fact: Wang Youcai is actually the first named character to appear in ISSTH after Meng Hao in chapter 1