"Han Baiyu, I'm trying to examine this. Can you keep it down?" Tan Mu waved a hand in annoyance.
He grabbed the muddled ghost of the goateed man and rubbed it furiously between his palms.
The ghost was kneaded into a small ball, thick plumes of white smoke billowing from its body.
It let out a series of miserable shrieks—one moment begging for mercy, the next crying for help, and then randomly screaming for "Big Brother" and "Black Dog."
The two black-robed priests remained completely indifferent, not even furrowing their brows.
Suddenly, a shroud of starlight descended over them.
Despite the sudden ambush, neither panicked.
A sonic wave of displaced air erupted from Tan Mu, causing the starlight above to stagnate for a brief moment and preventing it from crashing down immediately.
Han Baiyu, an expert at escaping, immediately grabbed Tan Mu's arm, intending to pull him away.
She struggled to signal Tan Mu with her eyes, urging him to unleash another sonic wave to resist the confinement of the Starlight Domain and buy her time to transport them away.
To Han Baiyu, a priest capable of slipping past their guard without a sound, closing the distance, and unleashing such a powerful spiritual light domain had to be at least a Dark Moon Priest.
As two black-robed Star Glow Priests, they had absolutely no intention of clashing head-on with a white-robed Dark Moon Priest.
But when Han Baiyu glanced over, she was shocked to find that Tan Mu—who was supposed to be stronger than her—could not even shift his eyeballs.
'How is this possible? Even against a Dark Moon Priest, Tan Mu has always had the strength to put up a brief resistance!'
Just as Han Baiyu was overwhelmed with tension and confusion, a figure suddenly materialized in front of them.
The white robe he wore was blindingly conspicuous, and the silver trim along its edges indicated that he was merely a Star Glow Priest.
'How is this possible?!' both of them screamed in their minds.
Tan Mu and Han Baiyu were simultaneously struck with absolute shock.
They could not fathom how a mere Star Glow Priest could possess such an overwhelmingly powerful Starlight Domain, rendering them—priests of the exact same rank—completely defenseless.
Looking at the newcomer's face, Han Baiyu realized he was not any of the famous white-robed Star Glow Priests she knew.
'When did the white robes produce yet another powerhouse?' she despaired. 'Are they trying to wipe us black robes out entirely?'
Li Ban had no idea what they were thinking, and even if he did, he would not care.
He plucked the goateed man's ghost from the male black-robed priest's hand. The spirit had been tortured beyond recognition and was on the verge of fading away.
With a single squeeze of his hand, Li Ban gave the goatee a swift, merciful end.
His Starlight Domain was potent enough to lock down a Solar Priest for several seconds. These two black robes did not stand a chance of breaking his restraints.
"Are you accelerating the collapse of this lesser world?" Li Ban communicated with the two black robes via telepathy.
"Yes," Tan Mu admitted straightforwardly.
Beside him, Han Baiyu pleaded, "White Robe, seeing as we are only collecting Wizard Embryo Fragments from a lesser world instead of targeting white-robed priests, could you please let us go?"
Hearing this, Tan Mu hurriedly chimed in. "Right, right, exactly! We were forced by circumstances to fuse the Wizard Embryo Fragments of two white-robed priests back then, and we've regretted it ever since. That's why we've only been cooperatively absorbing fragments from shattering worlds lately."
Li Ban sneered. Glancing at a woman's corpse on the ground, he said, "You regret becoming black robes only because you couldn't handle being hunted down by the white-robed priests, not because you feel guilty about fusing other priests' Wizard Embryo Fragments. Just like how these ordinary people pose no threat to you, so no matter how many of them you kill, you feel absolutely no remorse."
Seeing these two black-robed priests, Li Ban already had a rough idea of how they were expediting the lesser world's collapse.
Directly destroying an entire lesser world required an immense amount of spiritual rhinoceros.
By releasing a Contamination Source like this, they could slowly infect the whole world, rendering it fragile and much easier to break apart.
Though this method was slower, it hardly consumed any energy.
He raised his hand and extracted the Wizard Embryo Fragment from Tan Mu, the black-robed priest. His movements were clean and decisive, and he did not even bother asking for the Wizard Lord's instructions.
To the side, Han Baiyu was dumbfounded.
As for Tan Mu, having his Wizard Embryo Fragment taken away did not just stun him—it shattered him completely.
Before he could even process what had happened, his entire body disintegrated into dust, becoming nourishment for this lesser world.
Li Ban looked down at Tan Mu's Wizard Embryo Fragment. To be honest, it was significantly smaller than that of a normal white-robed Star Glow Priest.
It just went to show that priests without true strength really were not cut out to be black robes.
The shortcut they had impulsively taken in the heat of the moment had ultimately turned into a bitter detour paved with regret.
Li Ban put away the male black-robed priest's Wizard Embryo Fragment, but he did not fuse with it.
He had only fused with Xiao Suo's Witch Embryo Shard previously to kill Xiao Suo permanently. In his mind and will, he still firmly clung to the bottom line of a white-robed priest.
But if he started fusing with the Wizard Embryo Fragments of other black robes, his motives would no longer be pure.
Even with the Star River in his possession, Li Ban could not be certain that he would be able to maintain his state as a white robe.
He then turned his gaze back to Han Baiyu.
Han Baiyu, still silenced and bound within the starlight, immediately cast him a look of desperate pleading.
Li Ban did not kill her right away. "It seemed like you were just about to use a special method to take him away?"
Hope instantly flared in Han Baiyu's despairing eyes.
"I can tell you the details of this spell. Will you let me go?" she asked.
Li Ban raised his hand and deactivated his Starlight Domain. "Tell me the truth, and I can spare your life."
Realizing she could finally move again, Han Baiyu clenched her fists, her heart a tangled knot of complex emotions.
Unfortunately, she was never particularly skilled in combat. With Tan Mu having been so effortlessly killed, any thoughts of armed resistance died in her mind. Obediently, she raised her right hand, revealing a jade bead bracelet hidden underneath her sleeve.
The bracelet looked utterly ordinary. Until she raised her wrist, Li Ban had not noticed anything unusual there at all.
He reached out, casually took the bracelet, and brought it up to examine it closely.
Upon careful inspection, he finally noticed the bracelet's anomaly.
The bracelet actually contained an enormous amount of spiritual rhinoceros.
This spiritual rhinoceros was in a sealed state, and combined with the special obscuring properties of the outer layer of jade, it had caused Li Ban to overlook the bracelet entirely.
Han Baiyu stared regretfully at the bracelet now resting in Li Ban's hand, knowing she was about to lose it forever.
However, white-robed priests were generally known for keeping their word. Though it pained her, she still explained how to use the bracelet to Li Ban.
"I found this bracelet in a lesser world. The material is highly unique; it can record elemental abilities and obscure its own existence. I've always used it as a Plain Ring."
'Isn't this just a variant of a Plain Ring?' Li Ban thought.
"Wait, you're saying it can be used to record elemental abilities without the element's owner actively channeling the ability into it?"
"Yes. There are a total of twelve beads on this bracelet. After coming into contact with elements, it can record twelve different elemental abilities, or the exact same ability twelve times. However, each bead can only release its stored ability once—in that regard, it falls short of a Plain Ring. Furthermore, once a bead's recorded ability is released, it takes a very long time for the bead to recover its capacity to record again."