Hair Mistress Battle
Ying Wu Xie answers that the abandoned Gu will confuse Fang Yuan and buy time, and when Bai Ning Bing asks whether he means to weaken her, offers to let her stay and hold the formation herself. She chooses his plan instead. She is not short of will to fight Fang Yuan, only of confidence she could win. On Snowy Mountain’s ninth peak, the five Central Continent immortals hang wrapped like cocoons in Hair Mistress’s blue hair, their essence draining fast. Yu Yi Ye Zi burns with earth furnace fire, but it cannot burn even one strand. Hair Mistress laughs that her move, blue hair constriction, grows stronger the longer it runs, active nonstop since Old Ancestor Xue Hu turned to refining fortune rivalling heaven Immortal Gu. She admits she did not lie about everything: her battle strength here truly reaches rank seven while all five are weakened, and she says surrendering might still leave them a chance to live. ch. 1251
A phantom figure suddenly slips free of one cocoon, passing straight through the hair without breaking it, and solidifies into Bu Zhen Zi. Hair Mistress sees a phantom path Gu Immortal explains his escape, and sends fresh hair at him, but he turns phantom again into another cocoon. Inside is Zhao Lian Yun, and Bu Zhen Zi tells her to drop her defense and follow him. She trusts him and lets her guard fall. She turns phantom with him and the two slip free; he repeats the rescue for the other three. Turning others phantom is rare even in phantom path, whose Gu Immortals are very few, and it is why Spirit Affinity House trusted him with her safety. All five now surround Hair Mistress, yet even facing five at once she is not overmatched, confirming her claimed rank seven battle strength. ch. 1251
Mu Ling Lan breaks off and looses three giant water wolves that tear through her hair wall and force her to flee into the sky. The five give chase. Outnumbered, Hair Mistress falls into pure defense, most of her hair destroyed, the rest curled into a ball that absorbs attacks and throws part of their force back; even Mu Ling Lan’s snake wave stab cannot pierce it. Bu Zhen Zi signals Mu Ling Lan, who sends a water snake creeping slowly toward the hair ball, though it is extremely fast. Bu Zhen Zi turns it to phantom so it slips through the ball, then solid again as it reaches Hair Mistress, breaking her second defense and piercing her heart. She screams as her soul tears free of her body, and the hair ball detonates into a spray of short hairs, forcing the five to shield themselves as her soul escapes. The battle ends there, credit falling mainly to Bu Zhen Zi, who freed them all, and Mu Ling Lan, whose attack landed the kill. ch. 1251
Victorious, the five plan to fall back for reinforcements, unable to take all of Snowy Mountain alone. But they find they cannot leave the ninth peak at all: the super Gu formation holds even against Bu Zhen Zi’s phantom transformation, and the collapse left them without a single formation path Gu Immortal. Yu Yi Ye Zi points out that no other Gu Immortal has come. Despite the noise of their fight, not even Old Ancestor Xue Hu has appeared, which they guess is a rank eight’s pride. Inside Zhao Lian Yun, love Gu suddenly flares with a majestic, rank nine aura, the same one that shielded them inside the collapsing spaceless tunnel. She loses control of her body, and Bu Zhen Zi tells the others not to disturb her since this is love Gu’s power, then explains bitterly how Spirit Affinity House’s signature Immortal Gu came to be hers. She wakes and says she now knows the formation’s every secret, and the others, overjoyed, press her to explain. ch. 1251
