Bai Ning Bing?
With the land spirit dead, Fang Yuan cannot see beyond the hall, but reasons from memory of his previous life that only two rank five experts, Xiao Mang and Mo Wu Tian, are loose in the blessed land, and both are tied down by the dog emperors for now. Of the rank four Gu Masters, he judges only Yan clan’s young clan leader Yan Jun capable of forcing his way through: a phantom path specialist in hiding and striking, who in Fang Yuan’s previous life fought demonic Gu Masters to a standstill at the battle of Yi Tian mountain before Mo Wu Tian beat him back. ch. 395
Fang Yuan privately resents how thin this blessed land’s central defense is, an imposing but useless bronze hall where Hu Immortal blessed land had Dang Hun Mountain itself as a wall, and even his own blessed land, built around a blood sea, did better. He kicks Feng Tian Yu awake and ruthlessly orders him out to block the phantom path Gu Master, even at the cost of his life. Feng Tian Yu, his strength nearly spent and untrained for real combat, agrees to do his best and walks out to what is almost certainly his death; Fang Yuan tells himself that sacrificing a refinement grandmaster for the second aperture Gu is nothing much. ch. 395
The second aperture Gu is nearly whole, flickering between real and unreal, unmovable, and good for only six hours before the light disperses and the work is wasted. His own aperture, only rank four upper stage, is already showing hairline cracks under the blessed land’s tripled time flow, and the next step, two more third watch Gu stacked together, will drive that flow to nine times normal speed. He has weighed the risk carefully and likes his odds, planning to leave the moment he has the second aperture Gu for a few months’ rest, with backup plans already in place. ch. 395
He activates the second third watch Gu, and under the combined pull of space and time, divine travel and third watch together, the light ball reshapes rapidly; Fang Yuan reflects that this is the true, ancient way of Gu, and finds he understands it better for having lived it. The first third watch Gu’s effect nears its end and the light ball starts to take firm shape while the noise outside grows louder, though none of Mo Wu Tian, Xiao Mang or Yan Jun has yet broken through. ch. 395
Just as Fang Yuan, excited, begins the second third watch Gu, Bai Ning Bing warns him that Tie Ruo Nan has broken the line and is coming for him. He cannot pull free of the refinement to face her, and with Feng Tian Yu already spent he has no one else to send. Furious and helpless, he orders Bai Ning Bing to come guard him, reminding her that poison vow Gu ties her death to his, though calling her away leaves the dog army leaderless and the whole siege open to being overrun; he cannot spare that a thought. Pressing on regardless, he thinks of himself as a fish laid out on the chopping board, and decides that whatever becomes of Bai Ning Bing once her use here is spent is not something he needs to consider right now. ch. 395
The hall’s door bursts open and Tie Ruo Nan strides in; recognizing him, her face turns from shock to eager joy as she vows to take the head of the little beast king and attacks at once with a spray of golden needles. Fang Yuan shouts for Bai Ning Bing, and a wall of ice rises to block the needles as she appears at the entrance, badly hurt: a wound from shoulder to sacrum cuts deep enough to show bone, green leaves cling to her clothes, her silver hair is scorched, and her whole left arm has gone purple with poison. ch. 395
Fang Yuan begs for a little more time; Bai Ning Bing curses him for wasting breath on it and throws herself at Tie Ruo Nan despite having less than ten percent of her normal strength. She quickly falls behind: her ankle turns, she drops to the ground, and a golden dagger flung from Tie Ruo Nan’s forehead mark just misses her neck and buries itself in the bronze tile instead. Rolling clear, she shouts to ask how much longer he needs; he shouts back to hold on even if it kills her. ch. 395
Bai Ning Bing warns that his death would follow hers before Tie Ruo Nan’s next attack cuts her off, and a few exchanges later, gasping, she announces she cannot keep fighting and will self-destruct. Startled, Fang Yuan asks whether her physique has already returned to full strength; by his own calculation the change should have taken several more months yet, even with the blessed land’s time running three times faster than outside. He shouts for her to hold on unless she truly cannot, and hears only a deep sigh in answer: it is too late. ch. 395
Cold spreads through the hall and ice begins forming with a crackling sound; Fang Yuan, his back to the door, turns with difficulty to see Bai Ning Bing floating high in the air, her body turning to ice crystal exactly as it had when she self-destructed once before at Qing Mao mountain. Glaciers crush toward Tie Ruo Nan, who is sealed inside the ice at the doorway before she can escape, crying out at what she takes for the legendary northern dark ice soul physique. ch. 395
The ice keeps spreading toward Fang Yuan himself, and Bai Ning Bing gives no answer to his shouts; her face turns indistinct and her crystal eyes go dark inside the ice. In alarm he uses Yang Gu on her, and its yang energy meets the cold in a swirl that echoes the scene from Qing Mao mountain years before, stopping the ice, though the distraction very nearly ruins the refinement. He forces his focus back, and under his effort the drifting light finally condenses into the second aperture Gu. ch. 395
In the middle of his triumph, a sharp ice blade drives through his heart from behind and out through his chest. Fang Yuan turns with what strength he has left to find Bai Ning Bing standing behind him, and addresses her in disbelief, though the ice form he has just watched go still and dark gives him no way to explain how she could be standing there. Tie Ruo Nan slowly walks over, her gaze filled with hatred, and tells him he has finally fallen into a trap. ch. 395
