When it comes to acting, Lao Gou is full of cunning!

Lin Yuan took out a simple banner he had prepared long ago from his Storage Pouch. The banner consisted of dozens of long cloth strips, and he hung it on the front of the Flying Boat.

As the wind blew, the cloth strips fluttered wildly, snapping loudly.

"Why hang these rags? It just adds unnecessary drag," Xue Linglong's voice carried a hint of impatience.

"The spatial rifts here are invisible. Hanging something can serve as an early warning," Lin Yuan's voice was calm and emotionless. He had specifically asked Han Shuang to help him sew this item.

Although the route map provided by Qing Tan said that spatial rifts were rare, his life was his own, and one could never be too careful.

Xue Linglong frowned slightly, inwardly thinking that this person was just being mysterious for no reason.

However, no sooner had this thought arisen in her heart than—shhh. A barely audible sound.

The outermost cloth strip, right before her eyes, snapped into two without any warning. The cut was as smooth as a mirror, and it drifted down silently.

Xue Linglong's pupils suddenly constricted to the size of pinpricks, and a layer of cold sweat instantly soaked her back.

She knew very well that if the Flying Boat had been even a fraction faster, or a single inch off course, what would have been sliced apart was not that cloth strip, but the Flying Boat's Spiritual Qi protective shield, or perhaps even their Physical Body!

Lin Yuan, however, acted as if nothing had happened. He deftly steered the Flying Boat, slightly adjusting the direction, and calmly avoided that invisible zone of death.

Xue Linglong said nothing more. In her heart, she felt a vague, indescribable sense of approval for Lin Yuan's near-paranoid caution.

Under Lin Yuan's control, the light feather boat slowed down, moving like a ghost through the layered canyons.

Inside the poisonous miasma, all sorts of bizarre plants grew. Lin Yuan even spotted several basin-sized, brightly colored poisonous spiders on a cliff face, lying quietly and blending in with the rocks.

Finally, the Flying Boat hovered in front of a massive cliff face.

The cliff had been split down the middle by a giant axe, forming a narrow gap that only allowed one person to pass through, resembling a sliver of the sky.

According to the route map, it was highly likely that the target of their trip was growing behind this gap.

The two squeezed into the narrow entrance, and the view suddenly opened up. It was an independent small grotto surrounded by cliff walls.

Through the faint yellow-green poisonous miasma, Lin Yuan's gaze was instantly captivated by a striking splash of blood-red.

It was a vine as thick as a finger, entirely blood-red, as if it were made of solidified flowing blood, clinging tightly to the distant stone wall. It was none other than the dragon blood vine!

Even a small section of the vine was enough to serve as the main ingredient for refining a cauldron of foundation establishment pill.

And this one before them, winding and coiling with astonishing length, Lin Yuan roughly estimated, could refine at least twenty or thirty cauldrons of Medicinal Pill!

Below the dragon blood vine, several other strangely shaped spiritual plants grew sporadically; they had clearly only been able to grow because they were tainted by the Spiritual Qi of the dragon blood vine.

Among them, a small, snow-white herb that looked like an ice crystal was particularly eye-catching.

"Ice Heart Herb!" Xue Linglong's breathing hitched suddenly.

"Is it the main ingredient for refining the supreme detachment pill?" Lin Yuan asked.

Xue Linglong nodded vigorously, her stunning face full of irrepressible joy.

But in the depths of Lin Yuan's eyes, a cold sharpness flashed suddenly. Something was wrong. It was too smooth. It was as if someone had set up a feast in advance, just waiting for the guests to arrive.

"It's a trap, be careful." Lin Yuan's lips moved slightly, and a voice as faint as a mosquito's buzz was precisely transmitted into Xue Linglong's ears.

The joy on Xue Linglong's face instantly vanished, replaced by a grave expression.

"I'll go harvest it, you guard the entrance. If there's any movement, break out immediately!" She immediately replied via voice transmission.

Lin Yuan nodded.

Xue Linglong's figure flickered, turning into a nimble black shadow, landing silently on the black stone below.

She took out a warm, smooth Jade Box and a small jade dagger, then gently and precisely harvested the few companion spiritual plants one by one, carefully placing them into the box.

Finally, she came to the dragon blood vine, left a two-finger-wide gap at the root, and decisively cut it down.

The moment the dragon blood vine was severed! Hum— A faint, eerie aura suddenly erupted from the cut of the dragon blood vine, spreading in all directions at an astonishing speed, instantly enveloping this entire space!

Xue Linglong's expression changed drastically! A cold, viscous feeling of sluggishness surged from the depths of her Dantian without any warning.

The originally warm and surging ocean of Spiritual Qi seemed to have been forcibly injected with mercury; every bit of magic power circulation became incredibly heavy and strained!

Her figure violently retreated, and she shouted sternly: "The dragon blood vine is a lure! It's an ambush, it's poison!"

Lin Yuan's brows instantly knitted into a frown. The moment the poisonous gas appeared, he had already closed all his pores and held his breath.

On his face, a perfectly timed expression of panic appeared, his figure stumbled, and he nearly fell to the ground. The aura on his body rapidly weakened, looking like a miserable state where his magic power had been crippled.

"Hehe... Only realizing it now, aren't you two a bit too slow?"

A hoarse, cold laugh rang out abruptly, filled with undisguised mockery. Before the voice had even faded, at the entrance behind Lin Yuan, the shadows squirmed, and a burly, bearded man wearing a dark red robe walked out slowly.

His face bore a grimace like a cat playing with a mouse, his burly body like an iron tower, completely blocking their retreat.

Immediately after, a flash of light appeared in the yellow-green poisonous miasma above, and a young man, also wearing a dark red robe but with a figure as thin as a bamboo pole, quietly appeared. He crossed his arms and looked down at them from above, blocking the path upward.

"Five Poisons Sect!" A sickly pallor appeared on Xue Linglong's face, and Lin Yuan's expression was equally unsightly to the extreme.

The Five Poisons Sect, an evil sect famous in the Eastern Region for their expertise in Gu poison, with ruthless methods and notorious reputation.

The bearded man grinned, his mouthful of yellow teeth looking extra chilling, "How does it feel? Does your spiritual power feel as heavy as if it were filled with lead? Hehe, don't struggle anymore. Once you've entered the pocket we brothers have set, even a true Dragon has to coil up obediently! If you're smart, hand over your Storage Pouch yourselves, and you might suffer a little less."

This Spirit-Dissolving Powder was colorless and odorless, spreading extremely fast. Anti-Miasma Pills were almost ineffective against this poison. Once contaminated, the toxin would act like a maggot attached to the bone, rapidly eroding the Meridians and turning one's robust magic power into a stagnant pool of water.

"What do we do?" Xue Linglong leaned her back against Lin Yuan, her voice carrying a trace of trembling she herself hadn't noticed.

"My magic power is fading rapidly. At most twenty breaths, and by then I'm afraid I won't even be able to activate a single Magical Artifact!"

"Fight our way out!" Lin Yuan's voice was cold, but his eyes were sharp as knives.

The opponent was clearly using a delaying tactic. Hearing this, a flash of determination crossed Xue Linglong's pale face.

She bit her tongue hard, and under the stimulation of the sharp pain, her spirit rallied. She slapped the Corpse-Raising Pouch at her waist heavily, and a rich, impenetrable black light instantly surged out.

"Thud!" A burly, tall corpse puppet in black robes appeared out of thin air, crashing heavily onto the ground, causing the black stone floor to tremble.

Its exposed skin was cyan-gray, with purplish-black veins protruding like twisted earthworms. A thick stench of corpses mixed with the smell of blood instantly permeated the air; even in this poisonous miasma environment, it was pungently nauseating.

In those hollow eyes, there was not a shred of vitality, only the most primal, cold killing intent toward living beings.