So, using the last bit of her remaining power, she grabbed Tianyu and pushed him toward the tunnel entrance.

"Leave! The mine is collapsing. Go now!"

Xueyin's voice was trembling. She pushed him again, even though her soul was almost transparent.

"But Master, you—"

Tinayu got visibly stunned to see such a side of his master. He thought even if she was forced to kill that guy, she wouldn't have trouble saving herself and him.

But the appearance of the Yin Soul Bead proved otherwise.

Due to Zhiran's meddling with the events, Master Xueyin got so weak that she couldn't take another explosion targeting her soul and save Tianyu from another powerful enemy.

She mistakenly thought the guy behind her was a foundation establishment cultivator after sensing his divine sense.

"Go! I cannot hold on anymore..."

Xueyin's voice slowly faded with extreme weakness.

So she didn't wait for Tianyu to argue. She forced a strand of power into his body once again and sent him straight out of the collapsing chamber.

The moment Tianyu flew out into the tunnel, Xueyin's form collapsed back into her ring, which fell to the ground with a soft sound.

While everything was happening like that, the explosion grew stronger. Flames and smoke filled the area. It was chaos everywhere.

Zhufeng's corpse shook from the shockwaves. The already damaged body twisted from the collapse.

Finally, the remaining soul traces inside him were extinguished fully, and Zhufeng died completely.

'Yin Soul Bead condensed with human souls is really something else.'

Inside another, quieter tunnel entrance, a figure crawled out with slow steps. Dust covered his clothes, yet a smile hung at the corner of his lips.

Zhiran stepped out with a glee that shone brighter than the flames behind him.

"Tch...Tianyu escaped unscathed... well, I expected that," he muttered lightly. He sighed in regret for a moment, but it disappeared too quickly.

His attention instead immediately returned to the rubble where the explosion originated.

There, he saw a fiery essence floating in the air. It was the Elemental Essence, a rare and priceless treasure that Tianyu was supposed to get.

Zhiran's hand shot out and grabbed it instantly, stuffing it into his storage.

Then his eyes fell on the ring that was lying quietly on the cracked stone floor. Master Xueyin's ring.

"Now this is interesting..." Zhiran whispered, picking it up without hesitation.

He already knew that the soul inside was too injured and weak. Moreover, it was already in a deep sleep.

Without using incredible treasures, that soul would never wake up.

After snatching the golden finger of the protagonist, Zhiran then looked around the collapsing mine once more, but there was nothing else left.

It seems that due to the explosion at the core, the mine became extremely unstable.

Cracks slithered across the cavern walls like hungry serpents, releasing waves of heat and dust with every passing breath.

The once-solid ground now trembled faintly, as if something deep below struggled to break free.

Even the spiritual energy in the air felt distorted and chaotic, curling unnaturally around broken rocks and shattered runes.

Due to the explosion at the core, this spiritual mine was now not worth much. Of course, it was still a treasure for the clan of Mistvale City.

Zhiran felt fortunate that those clan leaders weren't near this area during this event. But still, he had to hurry up before they returned.

'Well, let's extract the brain first and leave directly. I hope I can get something useful this time.'

Zhiran thought, walking slowly towards the corpse of Zhufeng.

Although the body of this guy was already in a very bad state and his soul had been wiped out, Zhiran still wanted to see what he would get from such a high-quality brain.

---

[A fresh brain with a damaged level of 76% is detected!]

[Do you want to perform extraction?]

---

As soon as Zhiran placed his hand atop the head of Zhufeng, he heard the voice from his system.

'Sigh...it seemed only a quarter of it is remaining.'

Although the damage level made him sigh, Zhiran still nodded lightly to extract. Such a powerful person, even if damaged, should give him something useful, right?

---

[Extraction successful!]

[Congratulations! You gained a deep memory of the Han Zhugeng: Soulforge Scripture (Basic Mastery)-Early Heaven Grade Technique]

---

'What?'

The moment Zhiiran looked at the prompt in his mind, he was completely surprised. Even feeling that he was hallucinating, he looked at the text again and again.

However, no matter what, the grade of the technique didn't change. It was a Heaven Grade without a doubt.

Although it was an early rank and with just basic mastery, it was a heavenly grade nonetheless.

'Damn!'

Just as Zhiran was getting excited, he suddenly felt a tug on his mind as if his system was about to show him a vision.

'Wait...don't do it now.'

Zhiran hurriedly stopped the system on time, saving himself from going into a trance. He didn't want to stay here any longer.

So, after thinking carefully, he first took out the Elemental Essence from his ring and burned the corpse of Zhufeng completely with its power.

He then buried the remaining Yin Soul Bead he had made with the help of a human soul, timed it perfectly, and left the mine immediately.

He made sure he left no trace of his presence anywhere while also dodging the clan members inside the mine who were approaching the area due to the earlier explosion.

'Sigh...fortunately, the clan leaders are still busy with those wolves.'

Zhiran sighed after successfully escaping from the mine. He then made a huge circle around the mine and finally joined his clan members outside, as if accidentally, taking control of them in the process.

Since Tianyu left them here to go into the core, they were having a hard time killing wolves all by themselves. Of course, they were happy.

"Boom!"

But their happiness disappeared the moment they felt an explosion. It was so massive that even the mountain they were fighting on shook violently as if some kind of devastating earthquake had occurred.

"AWooooo!"

Even the wolves all around stopped anxiously while getting disoriented by the impact.

This was the case for those outside, let alone those inside. The subsequent explosion of the Yin soul beads and the collapse of the mine buried anyone who was inside the mine just now.

"Who dares?"

Clan Leader Zhao of the Zhao clan roared in anger after finding out the situation. The same was for Lin Darong, He Wenhai, and Mo Jian.

Their faces didn't look good. The moment they felt the mine collapse, they left the fight and came directly above it, looking at everything with solemn expression.

Even the Wolf King didn't pursue them anymore. Rather, it howled and summoned all the remaining wolves around before disappearing into the forest.

It seemed it was quite injured.

"It seems the explosion first started from the core."

Lin Darong mumbled with an ugly face while looking at the jade slip clenched in his hand. The same was true for all three clan leaders, too, who finally had time to look at the message from their clan members.

Due to the fierce fight, they weren't able to look at it before. But that proved extremely costly for them, as they could see that the mine completely collapsed on its own.

Not to mention the members of their clan inside, even the spiritual vein began to scatter slowly, which they could feel with their divine sense.

A mine that could be utilised for over a century could no longer be used. It was a massive loss.

"Who is it?"

Mo Jian was feeling so heartbroken that he clenched his teeth in fury. Not only was he angry that someone destroyed what was his, but he was also more afraid of losing someone.

After all, he had asked Mo Tianyu to enter the core of this mine before. If he lost his life due to this, he didn't know how he could give an answer to the Divine Cauldron Sect.

Just thinking about it made his head ache.

"Hmm?"

Just as he was feeling stressed about his situation, his divine sense suddenly picked up someone on the rubble below. Not only him, but other clan leaders also sense someone's existence.

"Swish!"

The moment they sense someone, all four of them disappear, appearing right in front of the person who was busy rubbing the dirt off his clothes.

"Tinayu?"

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