The people of the Ripple Mist sect had been sensing some abnormalities with the Sacred ground and thus the patriarch of the sect had ordered the elders to check upon it. The first thing they checked was the gate of the sacred ground and it was normal and thus the only other option for them that was left was the formation array instead.

Now, this was a troublesome matter for them. The formation array of the sacred grounds was set up in multiple parts. The main part of it that composed of over fifty percent of the formation array was entirely based in the sacred grounds itself.

And that was the part which could not be touched by the elders, and they could not send the disciples in either, as the time period of the sacred grounds opening was over as well. In fact, the only reason why they found out about this due to the disciples who had been chosen to enter the scared trials.

Inside there they found out that the spirit Qi concentration in many areas was far lower than normal and the number of resources they got this time was the lowest in fifty years. The sect's elders had prepared the disciples thoroughly so that they could get more this time around, but it still did not help.

This had bothered the sect patriarch very much, along with the high elders. The lower elders though, were a bit confused as to why the patriarch and the others were so obsessed about the resources.

Sure they were valuable, but it was not like the Ripple mist sect was in a dire need of them. Even if the amount that they got from the sacred grounds was lesser than it used to be, the resources they had gotten over the years were still plenty.

After all, not all of the resources that were obtained from the sacred grounds were used. Usually, only fifty percent of them were used while the rest were conserved for later times. Due to this, the sect had quite a stockpile of them.

But for the past year or so, the elders and the patriarch have been a bit obsessive about resources, so much so that they had increased the exploratory and harvest missions by two fold. In addition to this, the sect also started to take the bounty requests which it usually did not.

But then about a month ago, the formation array of the Sacred grounds started to react rather strangely. There were multiple break downs that appeared around the gate of the sacred grounds.

As soon as the elders saw this, they knew the situation was dire. If the outer formation were affected to this extent, it meant that the internal formation array of the sacred grounds was vastly affected too.

The patriarch was infuriated and had thus ordered them to fix it as soon as possible, which was what they were doing right now. But they had never expected for the gate of the sacred grounds to suddenly activate.

Usually, it only activates to allow the disciples to enter or exit the sacred grounds. And it occasionally ejected some disciples from the trials too. This was originally a feature to prevent intruders from entering the sacred grounds, but had not been utilized for that in a long time.

The sect never had an intruder in the past fifty years and thus the only time someone was ejected was due to a disciple's breakthrough to the Nascent Soul realm in the sacred grounds.

There were many disciples who were at the peak of the core condensation realm and they delayed their breakthrough for the sacred trials, Senior Sister Bi was one such example and had taken advantage of the opportunities in the sacred grounds to have her breakthrough to the Nascent Soul realm there.

Not only did she manage to successfully break through to the Nascent Soul realm, but due to the high concentration of spirit Qi in the sacred grounds and the resources she had obtained there, she even managed to progress quite far into the Infant Soul stage.

In fact, the elders even thought that it would not be long before she would break through to the Child Soul stage of the Nascent Soul realm. Perhaps two years later, the sect would have another cultivator at the Child Soul stage.

But now the appearance of three Nascent Soul realm spirit Qi fluctuations at the gate, that too nine months after the trial had ended was shocking to the elders and disciples here.

"Huh? A beast?

" one of the disciples said.

The first being they saw was none other than Little Shrubby, who was at the Nascent Soul realm.

"Did one of the beasts accidentally get ejected from the sacred grounds due to the malfunction?

" someone else wondered.

"NO! There are two men there too!

" A junior elder spotted Lin Mu and Jing Luo, who had finally appeared fully.

"How is this possible?

" The elder who was the supervisor couldn't help but say in shock.

Finally, everyone saw the people who had appeared clearly. There were two men, one of them was wearing a mask while the other man was big and muscular. The third was not even a human being a Liger like beast with red and black fur.

"Oh my, more than I expected…

" Lin Mu muttered.

Jing Luo's eyes darted around and he saw all the formations that were currently being worked on by the disciples.

"Looks like our plan had been affecting the formation arrays of the sacred grounds.

" Jing Luo said in a low voice.

"No wonder they are here. I thought we may at least get to surprise them and get a head start.

" Lin Mu replied.

"Kill?

" Little Shrubby asked as his claws extended and started to heat up.

Lin Mu looked around as his spirit sense spread fully. Everyone that was in the range was currently in the range of his spirit sense, and they could feel the pressure exuding from the spirit sense as well.