Chapter 1131 - 1231: Facing and Killing Intent

However, just as Ye Tianfan was contemplating this matter, he suddenly saw a creature from beyond the wall appear ahead!

It was a creature with tiger stripes on its body, and its mouth was full of sharp teeth, which, as Ye Tianfan saw from its roar, extended all the way down to its throat.

Moreover, Ye Tianfan saw that although this creature had a tiger's stripes, it had four hooves, and on those hooves were sharp claws, which meant that each hoof had several sharp nails, glimmering with a dark purple cold light.

Ye Tianfan also noticed that this creature had six legs, indicating that it was even faster.

Most importantly, it had a black wolf's head, and its black-purple eyes were filled with murderous intent.

Seeing this killing intent, Ye Tianfan broke out in cold sweat, which continued to flow.

And this was without the creature deliberately fixing its gaze on Ye Tianfan; just from Ye Tianfan looking in its direction, cold sweat ran down his back, illustrating the immense pressure this creature exerted on him.

Yet, the creature's main target was Taichu Zhenren.

After all, in its perception, among all present, only Taichu Zhenren posed the greatest threat to it.

Especially the sword in Taichu Zhenren's hand, the Xiaoyao Sword, emitting a white glow, which, in this creature's perception, was a massive threat; and this awareness wasn't something it only just realized, but rather something it had sensed following that sliver of dangerous aura to this place.

The creature gazed at the Xiaoyao Sword in Taichu Zhenren's hand, its eyes revealing deep-seated killing intent, wanting to destroy it. This was not only about eliminating something dangerous to it, but also because the direction these people, including Taichu Zhenren, were heading was the territory of the creature it served.

This creature didn't want these people to disturb its boss, so it appeared early to eliminate these threats.

Even though this creature believed that even if Taichu Zhenren and the others entered its boss's domain, it was unlikely they would survive, it needed to protect its boss's territory. Otherwise, if its boss was disturbed, they might very well direct their rage toward it, leading to its true demise.

As the creature was quite afraid of death, it did not want to find itself caught in this danger, hence it appeared early. After all, the boss it served had a notoriously volatile temper.

But could there be any creature beyond the wall that didn't have a volatile temper?

Perhaps because these wall creatures were always in contact with negative auras like Demonic Qi and Evil Qi.

Thus, these creatures almost never had moments of calm, nearly always engulfed in rage.

While they might be able to communicate peacefully with beings of equal power, if the other's power was significantly weaker, they wouldn't communicate well at all, instead, engaging with pure rage.

At this time, Taichu Zhenren was already on guard because this creature's strength, as he sensed, was about on par with his own, perhaps even slightly stronger.

Although Taichu Zhenren stood at the pinnacle of the Shifang Realm.

Such creatures from beyond the wall, however, could not be classified according to the inner wall's power hierarchies.

Technically speaking, if Taichu Zhenren improved a little more, he would directly break through to the Taichu Realm.

But this creature from beyond the wall was slightly higher than Taichu Zhenren, not by much but enough to enter the Taichu Realm. Yet, in reality, this creature had not entered the Taichu Realm; rather, it seemed stuck in the Shifang Realm, possibly because the power divisions beyond the wall differed from those within.

After all, the cultivators within the wall trained with Cultivation Techniques, each level had its distinct methods, but the classification was the same, meaning that inside the wall, to enhance strength, each level had its own threshold to pass.

Though each level was fairly smooth, encountering a bottleneck meant being stuck for a long time without advancing to the next phase, but the wall creatures had no such peace; their entire cultivation relied on the slow, incremental accumulation over time.

Even if these creatures had no bottlenecks, their cultivation cycle was exceedingly long. For instance, when an inner wall cultivator advanced from the Pinnacle of the Baihui Realm to the Shifang Realm, their strength would increase dozens or even hundreds of times, while those inner wall demon beasts and beyond-the-wall creatures had no systematic cultivation method.

Therefore, for these beings, both the creatures beyond the wall or the inner wall demon beasts, their way of improving strength was slowly, little by little, like a cultivator suddenly increasing their strength by dozens or hundreds of times.

And for these inner demon beasts or outer creatures to cross this dozens-to-hundreds fold in strength, they would have to slowly increase over time.

This is why some demon beasts already have lifespans of hundreds or even thousands of years, yet their strength doesn't match that of a human who has cultivated for a hundred years.

This is the difference between Cultivation Technique training and ordinary cultivation. Taichu Zhenren sensed this creature from beyond the wall had slightly more strength than himself, indicating that the wall creatures' cultivation methods likely aligned with the inner wall beasts, slowly advancing little by little.

Unlike the cultivators who could leap in strength suddenly, this made Taichu Zhenren even more vigilant because it meant this creature before him had probably lived for at least ten thousand years.

Because Taichu Zhenren himself had been cultivating for at least a thousand years, and it took him this long to reach the Shifang Realm, a demon beast would need at least ten thousand years to reach that level of strength, unless they possessed extraordinary talent or high innate advantage, which would allow them to cultivate much more swiftly, yet still not as fast as humans.

Even though these demon beasts could not match humans in cultivation, their experience in slaughter and combat far surpassed that of humans due to their longer lifespans and wider range of encounters. Although they may lack wisdom, they could still rely on instinct and life-threatening situations to gradually refine those experiences.