The old man's face was gaunt and thin, his body clad in a simple grey robe, his movements calm and composed, without anything remarkable about him. If he were to walk through the streets of an ordinary town, it's likely that no one would be able to tell that he was a cultivator.

  But looking at the two people following behind him, not to mention Yan Hong, even Li Xun, who has always been arrogant, seems to be very respectful of this ordinary old man, and his expression and behavior do not dare to be slow.

  At this moment, when the old man asked, Li Xun hesitated for a moment and then said: "Master Shu Mingjian, in fact, it was the death of the leader of those fish-like barbarians that caused these monsters to go berserk, which is why..."

  At this time, the three of them happened to have just walked down from the Xuanhuo Altar. The old man in gray robes furrowed his brow and said calmly, "How did the Fish Tribe's leader die?"

  Li Xuan sighed and shook his head. Yan Hong said beside him, "Reporting to Master Shu, the fish tribe leader was killed by a master assassin less than one mile away from the 'Unnamed Ancient Temple' in Hegou Mountain three days ago, after meeting with Lu Shun and Master Lu."

  The old man in grey robes exclaimed, "Huh?" and was apparently somewhat surprised. He asked, "Who is the murderer?"

  Li Xun shook his head and said, "We've been investigating for several days, but we still haven't found any leads." He seemed to hesitate for a moment before continuing, "Actually, this matter should have been reported to Master Shu long ago. However, since Master Shu has been guarding the Xuanhuo Altar for nearly a hundred years and no longer asks about worldly affairs, I didn't want to disturb him."

  The old man in grey robes smiled and said, "I am aware of the valley master's kindness. If it weren't for these barbarians still having some use, and if I hadn't had some prestige when I subdued them back then, the valley master wouldn't have bothered with an old codger like me."

  Li Xun smiled wryly, just about to say something, but the old man in gray seemed reluctant to continue on this topic and changed the subject: "Wasn't Lü Shùn also present at the time? Within a distance of less than one li, couldn't he find the murderer? Even if he had to dig three feet underground, he would have dug him out by now."

  Li Xun heard this and couldn't help but exchange a glance with Yan Hong beside him. Yan Hong hesitated for a moment, then said in a low voice: "It seems that the murderer was too cunning and had a high level of skill, so after one successful strike, he immediately escaped, leaving even Master Lü unable to catch up with him."

  The old man in grey hummed and didn't say anything else, but from his expression and tone, a hint of disdain was evident, clearly looking down on Li Xu and Yan Hong's mention of Lu Shun, Lu Shi Shu.

  The three of them walked and talked, and the empty space of only three zhang had already gone halfway, and Gui Li was also gradually getting farther away. Gui Li slowly put down his heart, but his body still didn't dare to relax. At this time, he only heard that the gray-clothed old man seemed to ask a question from afar, because they were walking far away, and the voice couldn't be heard clearly, but vaguely heard that the gray-clothed old man was asking about the current situation of those rebellious fish people barbarians.

  Li Kan responded from behind, "The situation has stabilized for now. Master Lv and the other disciples have blocked those monsters at the entrance of the valley and used their divine powers to suppress the Fish People's momentum. Both sides are currently in a standoff. Those Fish People keep saying they want to avenge their tribe leader, but the Valley Master doesn't want to completely break off relations with the Southern Barbarian tribe, so he sent us to invite Master Lv..."

  Just as they were talking, a loud whistle suddenly came from the direction of the entrance to the distant mountain valley, echoing far and wide. The sound was extremely mournful. Everyone present was shocked, and Li Xuanyu exclaimed: "It seems to be from the entrance!"

  Before they could react, the sound of fierce fighting and killing erupted again, with angry shouts and screams filling the air. The mountain valley, which had just fallen silent, was once again shrouded in the sounds of slaughter.

  The three of them changed color, the old man in gray hummed and swung his sleeve robe, turning into a gray light that shot up to the sky and flew rapidly towards the direction of the mountain valley entrance. Li Xun and Yan Hong also followed closely behind.

  They didn't wait for their figures to completely disappear into the night, Gui Li slowly walked out from under the Xuanhuo altar, hesitated for a moment, and turned around to look at the Xuanhuo altar.

  Before my eyes, this massive building stands towering, even a single white jade pillar beside me looks so majestic and grand in the night, not to mention the crimson hall on top of it.

  Not far ahead, it was the stairs that the old man in gray and Li Xun and Yan Hong had just walked down. Gui Li walked towards those stairs, only to see that all the stairs were also built with the same kind of strange red stone as the high place, blending seamlessly with the surrounding railing stones.

  Slowly stepping on it, the ghostly figure walked upwards, and at this moment the heat around seemed to rise even more, as if what was underfoot was not that crimson stone, but real flames.

  The thirty-sixth step of the Xuanhuo altar went up, turned a corner and continued to extend upwards. Gui Li took a deep breath, his face cold and pale, slowly walking upwards. The surrounding railings and stone walls were plain and unadorned, showing their simplicity.

  Even the wind blowing from the night sky was extremely hot, Xiaohui lay on Gui Li's shoulder, her eyes rolling around curiously, looking around in all directions.

  Finally, after walking through the three-story, 108-step staircase, Gui Li arrived at the Xuán Huǒ Tán.

  Although I had already seen the scene from afar at the bottom of the Xuanhuo Altar, now standing on top of the Xuanhuo Altar, in front of the towering grand hall in the center of the altar, looking up at the gigantic building that was hundreds of times taller than myself, looking up at the tower spire that pierced the sky like a sharp sword, Gui Li still couldn't help but feel a sense of insignificance.

  The same crimson stone material was cut into huge stone blocks of equal size, each block almost as tall as a person. They were piled up to form a magnificent hall. As I walked closer, in the scorching air, I clearly saw that these stone blocks were connected so tightly that even a knife blade couldn't be inserted into the gaps between them. It was really unimaginable how the ancestors of Valley of Incense had built such a magnificent and ingenious hall.

  Even he almost had an illusion, in front of him was not a temple, but a huge flame burning fiercely. And this flame was so huge that it seemed to be about to crush down and swallow the tiny self.

  The ghost took a deep breath, calmed down, and suppressed the feeling of shock in his heart. He then turned around and carefully examined the path that led to the entrance of the Mystic Fire Temple. He didn't have to exert much effort before finding it.

  The entire tower-like altar had no windows at all, and was completely surrounded by huge crimson stones. Only on the lowest level, not far from him, there was a door that was one zhang high and six chi wide.

  The ghost walked past, and soon discovered that although the door was painted with red lacquer, it was different from the surrounding stone walls, but a wooden door. It's also reasonable to think that if the entrance and exit doors are also extremely heavy stone doors, they must be very troublesome!

  The ghost stood in front of the door for a while, but didn't push it open immediately. Instead, he turned his body around and looked back.

  The entire altar of the mysterious fire was silent except for the hot air.

  "Ouch!"

  The next moment, he pushed open the door.

  The entrance of the Valley of Incense was now a river of blood, with over a hundred tall and strong Fish-head human barbarians shouting loudly in extreme anger, wielding all sorts of strange weapons, including guns, knives, swords, and spears, as they clashed ceaselessly with the disciples of the Valley of Incense. The ground was covered in fresh blood, with severed limbs scattered everywhere, and while there were not a few casualties among the disciples of the Valley of Incense, there were even more Fish-head humans.

  As for these limbs, they were probably cut off by those brutal fish people.

  Although the scene was terrifying and the fish people were extremely ferocious, the situation was that the Huoxiang Valley side was gradually gaining the upper hand over the fish people. Moreover, it seemed that Huoxiang Valley still had some leeway left, with dozens of disciples with higher cultivation levels forming a semicircle shape, pressing inwards together.

  These fish-like humans are extremely ferocious and have bodies that are greatly different from those of humans. Even if a cultivator were to withstand a sword light emitted by a disciple of the Furnace Fragrance Valley, they would likely suffer injuries. However, these fish-like humans have extremely resilient bodies for some unknown reason. Moreover, it seems as though the people of the Furnace Fragrance Valley had received some sort of order and held back. Except for the sword lights and magical treasures of a few high-level experts, the magical treasures of the other disciples that landed on their bodies only managed to send the fish-like humans flying, making it extremely difficult to see any blood.

  However, the people in Fengxiang Valley have been cultivating for many years and their Taoist skills are not shallow. In a one-on-one battle with the power of magic weapons added, they can still defeat these barbarian fishmen. Secondly, these fishmen are just strong and thick-skinned, but the disciples of Fengxiang Valley advance and retreat in an orderly manner, sometimes riding swords to fly up from mid-air to attack down, often making the fishmen extremely frustrated, and still have the upper hand.

  Among the disciples of Huixiang Valley, an old man stood in the middle directing, who was exactly Lv Shun that Gui Li saw at the ancient temple on the desolate mountain that day. At this moment, he only saw his eyebrows tightly furrowed and his face extremely ugly, obviously extremely angry.

  The fight had reached its climax when suddenly a mournful cry rang out. One of the disciples of Fengxiang Valley had let his guard down for a moment, revealing an opening that was seized upon by one of the fish people, who used a weapon resembling a hook to snag the disciple's foot and drag him down from mid-air, slamming him to the ground. In an instant, several fish people swarmed over, their blades flashing wildly, and the disciple was killed in the blink of an eye, his body not even intact.

  In an instant, the disciples of Valley of Incense were in an uproar. Many people could no longer control themselves, and with increased strength, the flying swords and treasures danced wildly in the sky, attacking in unison. However, after a moment, miserable cries rang out one after another, and several fish-like humans had been hacked to death by the treasures.

  These fish are naturally ferocious, and seeing the bloody scene not only didn't show any fear, but instead became even more frenzied and pounced on each other to fight, being fierce and fearless of death.

  Lü Shun yelled loudly, flying his sword into the air, but neither the fish people nor the disciples of Fengxiang Valley below paid any attention to him, their eyes bloodshot with killing intent, and an even greater massacre was about to unfold.

  Just then, the originally bright moonlit night sky suddenly darkened, Lü Shun furrowed his brow and looked up at the sky, only to see a mass of gray clouds rolling in. Lü Shun's expression changed, and he couldn't help but hum a sound.

  That gray cloud came with what speed, in the blink of an eye it had flown to the front, and its momentum was getting bigger and bigger. Only half the sky saw the wind sound urgent rotation, gradually evolved into a diameter of several meters of tornado, mixed with sharp sounds, "Woo" a sound, from the night sky rushed down.

  Almost at the same time, all the flowers, grass and trees around the ground were blown outward by the strong wind, sand and stones flew everywhere, and some of the weaker disciples of Fengxiang Valley and some fish people were even swept away by the wild wind.

  Everyone was shocked and lost their color, before they could react, the tornado had already landed on the ground. In the midst of the sharp whistling sound, a loud "bang" echoed, dozens of fish people were caught by an invisible giant hand, and were smashed into the air, flying backwards, heavily crashing to the ground.

  Those fish-like creatures were chattering loudly, their voices shrill and unpleasant to hear, but it was clear that they were terrified. The fierce wind turned again for a moment, separating all the fish-like creatures and the disciples of Fengxiang Valley, before slowly coming to a stop. As the sound of the wind gradually subsided, the massive gusts also dissipated, revealing the figure of an old man in gray robes.

  The crowd of disciples in the valley were stunned for a moment, then they all fell to the ground and paid their respects to the old man together, saying: "Master Shangguan."

  Lü Shun also slowly fell back to the ground, walked over, looked at the old man in gray clothes with a glance, his face twitched, and then smiled awkwardly: "Shangguan brother, such a small matter, how did it shock you, a big shot?"

  The old man in grey looked at him and smiled faintly, saying: "The master of the valley has given an order, I have no choice but to come."

  Lü Shun's face changed color.

  At this time, Li Xuan and Yan Hong also arrived, falling from the sky. Li Xuan walked to Lü Shun's side, lowering his voice, saying softly: "Lü Shifu, it was Master Gu who ordered me to invite Shangguan Shifu."

  Lü Shun grunted and his face looked even more unpleasant, but he didn't say anything else and turned away.

  The old man in grey didn't even look at him, turned his body and looked at the bloody floor in the arena, his face sank.

  At this time, all the fish people gathered in one place, their eyes fell on the gray-clad old man. It was as if they recognized the gray-clad old man, and for some reason, these fierce and fearless fish people seemed to be afraid of this ordinary gray-clad old man, and for a moment, they didn't dare to rush forward.

  The old man in grey robes withdrew his gaze and said in a low voice: "Where is Sun Tu?"

  As soon as the words fell, a middle-aged man ran out from among the disciples of Huo Xiang Gu, who was none other than Sun Tu, who had gone with Lü Shun that night and knew the language of the barbarians.

  He saw him run to the side of the old man in gray clothes, his face extremely respectful, and said: "Disciple is here."

  The old man in grey clothes looked at him and saw that he was covered in dust and dirt, apparently having suffered a bit in the previous fight due to his low cultivation level. Fortunately, he hadn't died yet. It was also fortunate that there were not many people who could understand the language of these barbarians.

  The old man in grey said, "Come over and translate what they are saying for me."

  Sun Tu carefully responded with a "yes" and stood aside.

  The old man in grey clothes looked towards Fisherman and said loudly: "I am Shangguan Ce, let one person come out to talk."

  On the other side, a commotion broke out among the fish people, and it was clear that they understood what Shangguan Ce had said. Moreover, this name seemed to have a magical effect on them, and it was extraordinary. After a while, a tall fish man walked out.

  Shangguan Ce looked him up and down twice, then said slowly: "Do you know me?"

  The fish man hesitated for a moment and said "Chee chee chee chee".

  "They know."

  Shangguan Ce's expression didn't change as he said, "Why are you attacking our mountain valley? Are you trying to bully us because you think the Valley of Burning Incense has no one?"

  The fish-man's face turned red with anger and he started speaking in a loud voice, "Hiss, hiss, hiss, hiss".

  "He said: 'Our clan leader was killed when he met with your people, and you say that the murderer can't be found. It's clear... it's clear that it was done by you people! Our Fish People Clan may not be a match for you, but we will fight to the death to avenge our clan leader!'"

  Shangguan Ce's eyebrows were tightly furrowed, and a hint of worry flashed in his eyes. He was the top figure in Fengxiang Valley, with profound and immeasurable Taoist skills. A hundred years ago, he had demonstrated his divine might in a secret battle against the southern barbarian tribes, intimidating them and spreading his fame throughout the sixty-three tribes of the southern barbarians. Today, the valley master Yun Yilan had asked him to come out of seclusion, which was also for this reason.

  Moreover, Shangguan Ce had long resided in the southern border and his understanding of these barbarian tribes in the vast mountains was unparalleled. Take this branch of fish-like barbarians for example; he knew they were ferocious and cruel, and the death of their chieftain was an unprecedented shame and humiliation for them. It's entirely possible that they would stop at nothing to die here with their entire tribe.

  If it were just this branch of the alien tribe, Shangguan Ce would not have put his heart into it. The southern border barbarians are fighting each other on the surface, but their internal relationships are complex and complicated. Moreover, in the past hundred years, an extraordinary person has emerged, who is not to be underestimated. If that person were to be startled, I'm afraid the great plan of Huixiang Valley would be ruined in an instant.

  He was pondering in his mind, and beside him, Li Xuan saw Shangguan Ce bowing his head in deep thought, and whispered to Sun Tu: "When I left just now, hadn't the situation been brought under control? Both sides were at a standoff, and neither side intended to take action. Why did it start again?"

  Sun Tu's face was bitter, and he smiled bitterly: "We are also wondering! Originally it was fine, although a bit tense, but neither side had the intention to continue fighting. Unexpectedly, there was a miserable cry from the fish people's place, and one of the fish people at the edge was inexplicably killed by someone. As soon as this happened, those fish people suddenly turned red-eyed, like madmen rushing up...

  Shangguan Ce's voice suddenly sank as he asked, "Was it one of our people who did this?"

  Sun Tu was momentarily speechless, but Lv Shun coldly said beside him: "At that time, it was chaotic, who knows?"

  Shangguan Ce's face turned cold and he suddenly raised his voice, loudly asking the crowd of disciples from Fengxiang Valley: "Just now when we were confronting each other, did anyone make a move to kill the Fisherman?"

  The people in Fengxiang Valley were silent, and the disciples looked at each other, but after a long time, no one came forward to acknowledge it.

  In the distance, the fish people were in an uproar, clearly greatly enraged.

  Shangguan Ce's eyebrows were tightly locked, and he suddenly said to the fish man standing in front of him: "I'll go take a look at that person's corpse."

  Having said that, he didn't wait for the fisherman's response and just walked past him.

  The fish man's face changed, but looking at Shangguan Ce's expression, he finally turned around and took him to a corner of the crowd, identified it for a moment, and then pointed to a fish man corpse, "chirped" a few words.

  At this time, Lü Shun, Li Xuan, Sun Tu and others also followed behind Shangguan Ce. Sun Tu said in a low voice: "The one who died is the fish man."

  Shangguan Ce stood beside the corpse, looking closely, his face gradually becoming unsightly. After a moment, he muttered to himself in a low voice: "Fierce, fierce."

  Li Kan stood behind him and also looked at the corpse, unable to help but frown. The fishman's corpse still held a large knife in his hand, but the head on his neck was gone, and not far away was a fishman's head, which seemed to be his.

  The merman was beheaded with a single clean and neat knife cut by someone.

  Li Kun's gaze inadvertently fell on the neck, only to see that the wound was extremely flat and even, clearly caused by a very sharp blade.

  "Huh!" Suddenly, Lü Shun beside him whispered softly and walked up to squat down and take a closer look at the merman's corpse.

  "What's wrong?" Shangguan Ce frowned and asked.

  Lü Shun looked at it for a long time, slowly stood up, but his face was already very unsightly, and he said in a low voice: "This wound is exactly the same as the one left by the murderer who assassinated the Fish Tribe's Patriarch. The wound is flat, the muscles are not twisted at all, but the blood vessels deep inside have a faint purple color for some reason."

  Everyone was shocked and hastily took a closer look, and indeed it was just as Lü Shun had said.

  Shangguan Ce's heart was greatly shocked, he suddenly turned his head, his eyes shining brightly, and said: "The murderer is right here!"

  Shangguan Ce's eyes were as sharp as a knife, extremely piercing. An ordinary old man suddenly seemed to radiate an unstoppable aura from his entire body. He slowly looked around at everyone, and surprisingly, no one dared to meet his gaze directly.

  The scene suddenly fell silent, with only an unknown night wind blowing from somewhere, rustling through the treetops, making a soft whooshing sound.