Despite the increased sense of urgency, Chu Feng didn’t blindly rush his way through the black threads. Instead, he carefully observed the black threads carefully while making his way forward.

  As a result, he wasn’t able to venture too deeply by the time fifteen minutes was up.

  A gush of spirit power encircled his body and teleported him back to the entrance of the black spirit formation gate.

  In a stroke of coincidence, the space beside Chu Feng started trembling moments after Chu Feng came out. Then, Wang Yuxian appeared beside him, seemingly being transported out of the trial by a gush of spirit power too.

  “What a coincidence.”


  The two of them looked at each other and smiled.

  “Do you want to swap?” Chu Feng asked.

  Wang Yuxian had mentioned earlier that they could swap spirit formation gates if both of them were to fail their respective trials.

  “Not yet. I’ve already gotten some clues. I just need some time to decipher it,” Wang Yuxian replied with a confident smirk.

  “Let’s continue on then.”


  Chu Feng nodded in agreement before entering the black spirit formation gate once more. He was brought back into the pitch-black formation space filled with black threads, but he swiftly noticed that the layout of the black threads had changed.

  He wasn’t too surprised to see that.

  The trial would have been far too easy if the layout of the black threads remained the same. One would just have to challenge the trial multiple times and memorize the correct path.

  For that reason, such trials tended to have a random element to them.

  In fact, Chu Feng wasn’t trying to remember the route when he progressed slowly on his first attempt. Rather, he was acclimatizing himself to the different conditions of the formation space.

  This time, he was going to try it seriously.

  He activated the Heaven’s Eye and began flitting ahead. The further he went, the more complicated the layout of the black threads became. That left him with no choice but to slow down by a fair bit.

  Even so, he was still able to catch sight of the endpoint just as the candle was about to burn out. There was an item floating there—a military seal!

  Military seals were often used as a symbol of authority to mobilize an army. The chances were that he would be able to mobilize the puppet army if he could get his hands on the military seal.

  Knowing that, Chu Feng immediately charged ahead at full speed.

  Right before the candle was about to go out, he passed through all of the obstacles and reached out his hand to grab the military seal.

  Weng!

  The moment Chu Feng wrapped his right hand around the military seal, the seal transformed into a whiff of smoke that seeped into his palm. At the same time, spirit power began shrouding Chu Feng, teleporting him back to the entrance.

  When he was finally pulled out of the trial, the black spirit formation gate was no longer anywhere to be seen. He turned to look at the puppet army, and he found that he now had a connection with it.

  Chu Feng raised his right hand and looked at it. There was a black mark shaped like the military seal he had seen earlier imprinted at the center of his palm. It was thanks to this that he now had a connection with the puppet army.

  Weng!

  All of a sudden, the white spirit formation gate and the entire puppet army formation vanished. Following that, a person appeared beside Chu Feng. It was Wang Yuxian.

  “Chu Feng, I’ve succeeded! I managed to lay my hands on the military seal! Look, look! This is the military seal!”


  Wang Yuxian excitedly showed the imprint of a military seal on her palm to Chu Feng. It was identical to what he had on his palm, just that his was black whereas hers was white.

  “You’ve succeeded too?” Wang Yuxian exclaimed in astonishment.

  She finally noticed the black military seal imprinted on Chu Feng’s palm.

  “It looks like we have both succeeded,” Chu Feng said with a chuckle.

  “That’s great! We can control the puppet army together now! Let’s head out and tell Elder Yao Cheng about this piece of good news!” Wang Yuxian cheered in delight.

  She began making her way toward the spirit formation gate, and the puppet army obediently followed her with organized footsteps.

  Chu Feng could have done the same too, but he chose to let her revel in the moment and quietly followed her instead.

  Just as he had expected, Yao Cheng, the Monstrous Spirit Clan’s Clan Chief, and the other clan members gathered on the square revealed baffled looks when they saw the puppet army organizing themselves in a neat formation behind Wang Yuxian. This made it clear to them that Wang Yuxian had managed to grasp control over the puppet army.

  Countless juniors of the Monstrous Spirit Clan had challenged the puppet army formation many times over the past eight hundred years in a bid to gain control over the puppet army, but all of them ended in failure.

  Yet, it took Wang Yuxian a mere thirty minutes inside the spirit formation gate to gain control over the puppet army. How could they possibly not be astonished?

  They did think that it was possible for Wang Yuxian to successfully grasp control over the puppet army after her result in the talent assessment formation, but they found it unbelievable how quickly she had managed to achieve the feat.

  “Miss Wang is truly extraordinary. It looks like you’re indeed the person whom the lord is waiting for. Otherwise, there’s no way you could have grasped control over the puppet army so easily,” the Monstrous Spirit Clan’s Clan Chief complimented in awe.

  She was more convinced than ever that Wang Yuxian was the person whom the lord was waiting for.

  “Elder, if what you said is true, Chu Feng should be the person whom the lord is waiting for instead of me.”


  Wang Yuxian turned to the puppet army behind her as she spoke.

  Shoosh!

  At her glance, the puppet army immediately parted from the center to create a passageway, where Chu Feng stood at the very end of it.

  “What do you mean by that?”


  The members of the Monstrous Spirit Clan didn’t understand what Wang Yuxian was driving at.

  “Elders, please take a look at this.”


  Wang Yuxian walked over to Chu Feng’s side and lifted his arm, revealing the black military seal on his palm to the crowd.

  “You have managed to grasp control of the puppet army too?”


  The Monstrous Spirit Clan’s Clan Chief stepped forward to examine Chu Feng’s black military seal, and her eyes couldn’t help but widen in astonishment. She could tell that the military seal on Chu Feng’s palm was real too.

  “The two of us challenged a spirit formation gate each. Chu Feng took the black spirit formation gate while I took the white spirit formation gate. We ended up obtaining the military seal together,” Wang Yuxian explained.

  “This young hero over here challenged the black spirit formation gate?” the Monstrous Spirit Clan’s Clan Chief asked.

  “Yes, the one he challenged was indeed the harder black spirit formation gate,” Wang Yuxian nodded affirmatively.

  “Young hero, it looks like I’ve jumped to a hasty conclusion regarding your talent. Do pardon me for my foolishness.”


  Following that, the Monstrous Spirit Clan’s Clan Chief actually bowed to Chu Feng to express her apology.

  “Pardon us for our foolishness!”


  The other clan members, including Yao Cheng, quickly followed suit. Their drastic change in attitude wasn’t without reason. They knew that the trial in the black spirit formation gate was much harder than that of the white spirit formation gate, but Chu Feng actually succeeded despite the odds.

  This was more than enough to prove his talent.

  “Elder, it’s a fact that I didn’t do well in the talent assessment formation. I don’t blame you for thinking of me that way,” Chu Feng replied with a smile.

  “Lord Clan Chief, look!”


  All of a sudden, one of the clan members pointed her finger at the statue and exclaimed. Yet another change had occurred to the pendant worn by the statue.

  The fluid inside the pendant was initially only at the halfway mark, but for some reason, it was on the verge of being filled to the brim now.