"Young Master Ji!" Upon seeing his spirit-soul shift its position, Old Ghost Seven and Xiao Yunduan immediately responded, "It's fine, you two step aside first, I'll go take a look at the situation." With those words, Ji Changkong's spirit-soul suddenly vibrated, and the nebula-like soul form abruptly transformed into an arrow shape, shooting rapidly into the distance.

Old Ghost Seven and Xiao Yunduan suddenly found they could no longer perceive any trace of Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul; it seemed as if in that very instant, Ji Changkong had completely vanished from this world, leaving not a single thread behind.

The two, who had intended to follow, sensed not the slightest breath of Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul. Unable to defend themselves against the threat of the Soul-Devouring Fungus, they could only reluctantly depart with Lan Xingyun and Huang Xun.

Concealing his spiritual presence, Ji Changkong quietly approached the individual. He sensed that the Soul-Devouring Fungus was currently drifting toward Xiao Yunduan and the others.

It was true that the Soul-Devouring Fungus required the aid of starlight to move swiftly. As Old Ghost Seven and Xiao Yunduan retreated, the surrounding starlight would become increasingly thin, inevitably causing the fungus’s speed to slow down drastically.

Therefore, Ji Changkong had no real need to worry about Old Ghost Seven and Xiao Yunduan.

The hidden schemer had long since entered the central zone where the Soul Fungus originally resided. After making a wide circuit, Ji Changkong passed through layers of dense starlight and finally reached that area.

The starlight was layered thickly, densely packed together; at a glance, this place was truly an ocean of light, without a single gap.

Within this ocean of light, a sphere-sized spirit-soul was forcefully pushing its way inward. His purpose in coming here was clearly not to use the dense starlight to nourish his soul; he was desperately charging toward the center of the light sea, expending an enormous amount of spiritual power.

What exactly was he trying to do? Ji Changkong was filled with doubt. Precisely because he was overwhelmingly curious, he did not rush to act. Instead, he used his spirit-soul to observe silently, waiting to see the man's next move.

The individual had dedicated all his spiritual power to breaching the deepest part of the sea of light. He seemed certain that the Soul-Devouring Fungus would not return shortly, thus he did not allocate any spare spiritual energy to sense his surroundings.

Of course, given the unfathomable mystery of Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul, even if the man had allocated consciousness to sense his environment, he would never have detected Ji Changkong’s presence.

Struggling violently to penetrate the densest area of light, the man’s soul energy was heavily depleted. Ji Changkong was confident he could instantly slay the man using a soul technique from the Nebula Soul Refining Art, yet he refrained from doing so.

Soon, the man’s spirit-soul finally squeezed into the spot where the light was most concentrated, seemingly collecting something within it.

After a while, the man’s spirit-soul finally released his consciousness to observe the movements around him, appearing to anticipate that the Soul-Devouring Fungus might be returning.

His spiritual consciousness quietly drifted past the area where Ji Changkong was hidden, without pausing; clearly, he had failed to detect Ji Changkong.

Suddenly, from the area where his spirit-soul resided, wisps of soft, dark cyan rays emerged. These gentle rays were profoundly marvelous, seemingly possessing some form of attraction.

Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul quietly coalesced his awareness and tentatively sensed the area. He discovered that the man’s spirit-soul had clutched tiny, dark cyan pebbles. His soul had wrapped around about a hundred of these small stones. After flying out from the starlight, he immediately retreated along the same path he came.

Ji Changkong clearly observed that as the man’s spirit-soul moved, the nearby starlight actually drifted slowly toward him.

The man’s spirit-soul could not possibly have this effect on starlight. It was certain that the dark cyan pebbles held within his soul could attract nearby starlight, drawing it in to gather.

Pebbles capable of gathering starlight—what did this imply? It meant that as long as one possessed these small stones, one could gather starlight wherever they cultivated, achieving twice the result with half the effort! No wonder this man was playing tricks in secret; his goal was to obtain those small stones. It seemed his earlier claim that the Soul-Devouring Fungus could gather starlight was also unreliable; it was likely the small stones were what collected the starlight, and perhaps the fungus gathered here because of the efficacy of those stones.

Thinking this through, Ji Changkong began to secretly probe, sensing the location of the Soul-Devouring Fungus and the direction of the starlight flow.

As expected, in the area where the Soul-Devouring Fungus was located, no starlight was slowly flowing toward them; all the starlight was gently moving in tandem with the man’s retreat.

Hmph! Daring to use me! I’ll let you end up grasping at shadows! A cold sneer arose in his heart. Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul moved, transforming into an almost imperceptible wisp of smoke, silently gliding toward the direction the man was heading. Because the Soul-Devouring Fungus was already beginning its return, Ji Changkong did not hastily strike, but merely followed closely behind him.

Only after the man had distanced himself significantly from the central zone did Ji Changkong suddenly unleash a Soul Ray! A Soul Ray finer than a needle was difficult for ordinary spirit-souls to detect. The man was focused on fleeing and never considered that someone might have marked him as prey and attacked him so suddenly.

Three minute Soul Rays bore down sharply from behind. Before he could react, they savagely pierced deep into his spirit-soul.

The man’s spirit-soul convulsed violently, and the tightly wrapped small stones instantly lost the binding force of his soul, plummeting downward.

Without hesitation, Ji Changkong, who was fully prepared and had been waiting for this moment, swept his spirit-soul across the area. All the falling pebbles were immediately ensnared by spiritual power, held suspended one by one, and then slowly enveloped by Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul.

The man, struck by the three Soul Rays, trembled for a moment, then suddenly shrieked, "I kindly warned you just now, and you repay kindness with enmity! You deserve to die horribly!"

"I didn't see any kindness you offered us," Ji Changkong’s spirit-soul moved next to the man, observing him coldly, and said flatly, "If it weren't for my spirit-soul being sharp enough to detect the approach of the Soul-Devouring Fungus early on, we might all have fallen into your trap just now and been swallowed by the fungus! Hmph! If you weren't trying to lure the tiger out of the mountain, you wouldn't have warned us about how terrifying the Soul-Devouring Fungus was before!"

"As I see it, those other people who ventured deep into the starlight with you were likely all accounted for in your scheme! Your heart is vicious, so why should I show you any courtesy?"

"Y-You, how do you know everything?" The man did not offer any defense, seeing that Ji Changkong had laid bare every one of his wicked tricks, a clear sign of panic in his demeanor.

"Speak! What exactly is the deal with the Soul-Devouring Fungus? And why can these small stones gather starlight? Answer truthfully, or I will end your life right now!"