After following the Purple Sword Palace contingent to the construction island at the Giant Wild Outpost and familiarizing himself with the local situation, Ye Qin did not linger long, returning to Linhai City a few days later.
Besides the stone city being hastily erected by the Purple Sword Palace at the Giant Wild Outpost, numerous other Immortal Palaces had also commenced large-scale city building in other strongholds.
In a short time, at least several dozen newly constructed stone cities dotted the various outposts across the Blood Sea.
Naturally, the majority of these were decoy immortal cities, meant to mislead the Demon Cultivators.
The truly intended immortal cities could not be exposed prematurely, lest they face the full, fierce assault of the Demon Cultivators.
These stone cities were spread out over vast distances, forcing the Demon Cultivators to undertake extensive, time-consuming, and energy-draining marches to target and breach the main forces one by one. This compelled the demons to disperse their forces to attack the various cities.
The consumable combat readiness supplies—various elixirs, spirit stones, talismans, and magic artifacts—prepared in the rear by Zhou Rong, an elder of the Purple Sword Palace, and Zhou Yi, the Young Palace Master, were entrusted to a small team led by Ye Qin. This team was tasked with transporting these supplies monthly to the massive islands in the Blood Sea where the Purple Sword Palace and allied Immortal Palaces were building their cities.
Ye Qin served as the squad leader. To his surprise, Palace Master Zhou assigned Zhou Yao as his deputy, keeping her away from the front lines. Transporting readiness supplies was important and did yield some minor merit, but it was incomparable to the rich merits gained on the battlefield.
Although Zhou Yao accompanied the supply runs, she didn't gain much benefit.
Ye Qin had thoughts on the matter but found it inappropriate to voice them.
The mission of transporting readiness supplies to the front lines was relatively straightforward, yet it still carried a degree of inherent risk.
While traveling from the East Sea to the Giant Wild Outpost was one thing, once inside the Blood Sea, ferrying the supplies from the outpost to the construction islands carried risks. Encounters with sea beasts, Demon Cultivators, or even treacherous fellow cultivators were possible.
Ye Qin led the team in transporting supplies once a month. Upon entering the Blood Sea, he proceeded with extreme caution, frequently altering the transport routes, preferring the hassle of diversion over the danger of being tracked by ill-intentioned cultivators.
During the rest of his time, Ye Qin continued his unceasing, focused cultivation.
Enhancing one's cultivation was the utmost priority for any cultivator aspiring to break through to higher realms. Every incremental increase in strength held the potential to bolster their power and preserve their life in a future major conflict.
It wasn't just Ye Qin; all cultivators on the Blood Sea battlefield were seizing their spare moments to intensify their training and strengthen themselves.
Under the circumstances where the Grand Elder Zhou Hong mobilized a contingent of strongmen from the Earth Tribe to aid in construction, it took several months for a rather spectacular stone city to stand firm on the massive island.
Such a stone city could not possibly escape the notice of the Demon Race.
During this period, traces of Demon Cultivator scouts occasionally appeared, peering at the stone city from extreme distances, only to be detected by Nascent Soul cultivators patrolling the surrounding sea lanes.
Over the following year or so, this small stone city endured several small-scale tidal waves of sea beasts.
Some Demon Cultivator scouts manipulated groups of high-tier sea beasts in the vicinity to probe the stone city’s defenses, attempting to gauge the strength of the cultivators guarding it.
These minor skirmishes instantly ratcheted up the tension around the stone city.
"Whoosh!"
Several streaks of rainbow light from flying swords cut across the sky above the Blood Sea.
Ye Qin, leading a small squad of five late-stage Golden Core cultivators, arrived at the Purple Sword Palace's construction point with a batch of readiness supplies, coincidentally encountering a sea beast tide attacking the city.
Under the powerful intimidation of the Demon Cultivators, masses of mid-to-high-tier demonic beasts surged toward the island like waves, numbering in the hundreds and thousands, including formidable eighth and ninth-tier sea beasts and aerial demons, all attacking the stone city.
Ye Qin watched the spectacle from a distance, sword in hand, astonished.
"Brother Ye, why don't we go over and slay some demons?..."
Zhou Yao’s eyes glittered; she was filled with an eagerness to charge into the fray. It wasn't just her; the other three direct disciples of the Purple Sword Palace in the squad were equally tempted.
"If you wish to go, then go. I will not," Ye Qin stated calmly, shaking his head. The storage bags containing the readiness supplies were on his person, and he couldn't risk getting haphazardly entangled in the main battle.
Zhou Yao pondered for a moment, instructed the others to remain, and then, drawing her sword, shot toward the battlefield like a startling rainbow.
The guarding Grand Elder Zhou Hong remained unhurried, leading several dozen mid-to-late-stage Golden Core cultivators, their swords drawn, to defend the four cardinal directions of the city walls, slaughtering the sea beasts that managed to breach the island and attack the structures.
The stone city lacked a defensive light barrier; combat was direct, hand-to-hand, or beast-to-cultivator. Although the cultivators had the advantage of flying swords and elevation, they gained little easy ground, as the sea beasts also deployed flying demonic birds to dive and attack.
With large packs of sea beasts surrounding the stone city, a fierce slaughter erupted. The entire island, spanning hundreds of li, was overturned; dust and stone billowed, the world darkened, and the miasma of blood rose to the heavens.
Meanwhile, the main contingent of Nascent Soul cultivators from the Purple Sword Palace remained hidden in ambush, unmoved, ensuring that the Demon Cultivator scouts could not ascertain the true strength defending the city.
Once the Demon Cultivators launched a full-scale assault on the city, the Nascent Soul cultivators lying in wait inside and around the area would immediately surge out to encircle and annihilate them, preventing any escape.
Only after this small battle was decided, the victory secured, did Ye Qin and his team fly into the city to complete the transfer of the readiness supplies.
Such minor battles involving beast tides occurred almost once or twice every month.
Over this past year, the Purple Sword Palace had gained something. Two or three vanguard Demon Cultivator scouts, attempting to force their way into the city, were encircled and killed near the stone city by a group of Nascent Soul cultivators led by Zhou Xing, unable to escape. Of course, the Purple Sword Palace also suffered losses during these minor beast tides: two mid-stage Golden Core cultivators perished, and one Nascent Soul ancestor sustained a minor injury.
However, after several Demon Cultivator scouts were slain, the remaining scouts learned their lesson. They ceased personal assaults and merely coerced sea beasts into attacking the city, engaging in various probes without commitment.
When Ye Qin arrived at the front lines, encountering occasional sea beast attacks, he mostly observed, refraining from participating in the actual slaying of the beasts.
After every engagement, Ye Qin would collect the vast amounts of sea beast materials harvested by the cultivators of the Purple Sword Palace and their allies—such as sharp teeth, scales, tendons, demonic eyes, and demonic blood—and transport them back to Linhai City. There, he would sell them in bulk to the major merchant houses for spirit stones, which he would then carry back to the demon-slaying cultivators on the front lines during his next supply run.
As for Demon Cores, they served as proof of killing demonic beasts. Cultivators submitted these directly to the Elder Corps of the Heavenly Dao Alliance and the Demonic Heaven Alliance to record merit, exchange for rewards, and have their names posted on the two Immortal Alliances' Demon Slaying Rankings.
Ye Qin constantly traversed between the Blood Sea and Linhai City, witnessing numerous small-scale conflicts.
However, the early engagements were not intense; they were merely minor probes. What truly captured the attention of all East Sea cultivators were the two rankings: the Nascent Soul Demon Slaying Ranking and the Golden Core Demon Slaying Ranking.
As East Sea cultivators poured into the Blood Sea to establish their presence and construct immortal cities of various sizes, the vanguard squads of the Demon Race had also spread widely throughout the Blood Sea, investigating the city-building movements of the East Sea cultivators.
Of the hundreds of outposts in the Blood Sea, at least one-third had experienced sporadic skirmishes.
The Demon Slaying Rankings tallied accumulated merits at the end of every month and were re-ranked, with the top one thousand names publicly displayed in the major Immortal Cities of the East Sea. These rankings were then inscribed onto jade slips, recording the merits and placements of all East Sea cultivators, sold publicly for an extremely low price. To check the merits, one only needed to purchase the jade slip summarizing that month’s leaderboard.
When heading out monthly to deliver readiness supplies to the front lines, Ye Qin habitually purchased a jade slip, reviewing the latest Demon Slaying Ranking situation on the way.
After reading them, he usually remained silent.
Zhou Yao took the jade slip, swiftly scanning her divine sense over the Golden Core Cultivator Ranking.
"Zhou Yao, Fifth Layer Golden Core, Purple Sword Palace cultivator, ranked twelve thousand eight hundred and eighth! Killed one Seventh-Tier Golden Core demonic beast, and five Sixth-Tier demonic beasts."
Zhou Yao searched for a while before finding this placement, feeling somewhat dejected.
She rarely had opportunities to enter the battlefield and only encountered chances to fight demonic beasts occasionally, resulting in pitifully meager battle merits.
Her ranking was far behind those of Jin Zhongshan, Pan Shuang, and Liao Xiaoxi. Jin Zhongshan, who had the highest merit, managed to push into the twenty-first hundred mark, close to the top thousand, but every subsequent rank gained was exceedingly difficult. Pan Shuang and Liao Xiaoxi were also within the top three thousand.
However, compared to Ye Qin, she at least had a ranking.
As for Ye Qin’s ranking, she didn't even bother to look for it. Zhou Yao frequently accompanied Ye Qin on supply runs and naturally knew that Ye Qin had not engaged in hunting demonic beasts from the start, so his name would not appear on the leaderboard.
The Golden Core Demon Slaying Ranking was already occupied by a large number of cultivators.
The top ten, top hundred, and top thousand spots were benchmarks, symbols of true strength.
These listed Golden Core cultivators clearly documented their names, cultivation levels, and origins.
The top hundred on the Golden Core Ranking, save for a handful of exceptionally powerful rogue cultivators, consisted almost entirely of direct disciples from the major Sect Masters, giants, and prominent Immortal Palaces. Their cultivation levels were generally between the eighth and ninth layers of the Golden Core stage, and each had slain at least one eighth or ninth-tier demonic beast.
The most conspicuous were undoubtedly the top ten.
Occupying the supreme position was Li Qingyu, a direct disciple of the Taihao Sword Palace, which specialized in the Way of the Sword and was affiliated with the Immortal Palace of the Heavenly Dao Alliance's Central Sect Master. He alone had killed three Ninth-Tier Golden Core demonic beasts, along with numerous Seventh and Eighth-Tier Golden Core demonic beasts.
The direct Golden Core disciples of the major Sect Masters and giants almost all held rankings within the top twenty or thirty positions.
These Golden Core cultivators who dominated the top ten, top hundred, and top thousand rankings, along with the Immortal Palaces backing them, naturally attracted immense attention. As for the rogue cultivators without established affiliations, they immediately became prime targets for intense recruitment efforts by all Immortal Palaces.
"Brother Ye, why don't you ask the Palace Master to transfer you to the battlefield? If you were fighting, you would certainly be within the top one hundred now, maybe even pushing for the top ten, making your name famous throughout the East Sea Cultivation World."
Zhou Yao looked at the rankings on the list, seeing that no direct disciples of the Purple Sword Palace were in the top one hundred, and felt deeply indignant.
"What's the rush? This Demon Slaying Ranking has only been issued for a little over a year," Ye Qin replied, shaking his head with a faint smile. "Your older brother, Zhou Yi, doesn't have a ranking either! He is at the Ninth Layer of Golden Core and has remained in the rear, gathering supplies while fully focusing on breaking through the peak of the ninth layer. I estimate that once he reaches the Great Completion stage of the Golden Core, he will certainly make his move, potentially breaking into the top thirty or fifty spots."