Crackle, crackle.

    A sound of ice crystals cracking is heard.

    Perhaps it is due to the loss of magic to maintain it.

    When the Dragon was received by Chen Yun into the Five-colored Porcelain Tower, the ice layer that had sealed the heavens and earth shattered and collapsed instantaneously. Numerous massive ice blocks fell from the sky and crashed onto the ground in a frenzied manner, just like a asteroid colliding with Earth being ripped apart by its atmosphere.

    Boom, boom boom.

    The massive ice blocks crashed onto Yinlong Island, producing a series of ear-piercing booms and raising countless clouds of dust.

    There were many that smashed into the water, causing massive waves to rise and fall.

    Fortunately, none of those present were ordinary people. After sensing the anomaly, whether it was Wu Kojiu, Qin Ming, and the Dragon Girl Sanjiu, or the leader and warriors of the merfolk, everyone released their qi to the outside, crushing the ice blocks that were heading towards them.

    Although everyone was deploying their qi to counter the formidable power of the ice blocks crashing down, none of their gazes left Chen Yun's body.

    After all, what had just happened was truly terrifying.

    A thunderous dragon of the level of a sect leader was instantly absorbed into Chen Yun's tower, leaving its fate unknown for the time being!

    Of course, Chen Yun, with his disheveled appearance, could guess that everyone was deeply affected by the event.

    However, he now had no time to attend to these matters. Instead, he anxiously extended his divine consciousness into the tower to confirm if the dragon would manage to break free.

    He indeed resorted to deception just now.

    Or, it's not exactly deception.

    In the instant when the Dragon Qing Long Xuexie array was shattered, Chen Yun immediately realized that with his true strength, he simply could not hold his own against a dragon using only two-tenths of its power for half a teacup's worth of time.

    Even with the help of the TaijiPurple Belt Robe, it wouldn't be enough.

    After all, this thing consumes spiritual awareness and can be pretty intense.

    If the spiritual awareness is consumed completely, Chen Yun will be at the mercy of others.

    Therefore, Chen Yun immediately conveyed an order to his external avatar that was mixed with Wu Kojiu and others, watching the battle.

    Its external avatar was instructed to perform the first wave of Yinshen-class spells, namely the "Galaxy Vortex" Soul Suppressing Spell.

    He knew that such a spell would definitely not harm the dragon in the slightest.

    But Chen Yun's purpose was never to win with the soul-suppressing technique.

    Chen Yun did this to buy himself time to raise the Five-colored Porcelain Tower.

    Of course, Chen Yun was well aware that even though his external avatar possessed strength comparable to a high-level Daoist monk in the middle stage, the "Galaxy Vortex" spell he cast would not be able to delay much time.

    So, he thought back to the time when he faced Lin Feiyun and the latter's use of the "Successive Soul Suppressing Technique".

    Back then, I suffered quite a bit from this technique.

    Although Chen Yun knew that even the Successive Soul Suppressing Technique would not cause any significant harm to the dragon, he understood that delaying a little time should be possible.

    As expected, the dragon quickly discovered the ruse, first breaking through the soul-suppressing technique performed by the external avatar, and then, in a very short time, breaking through Chen Yun's spell once more.

    It was only in that brief moment of time that the external avatar successfully raised the Five-colored Porcelain Tower, allowing Chen Yun to emerge victorious.

    He had previously promised the dragon a one-on-one battle, allowing his external avatar to join in, which seemed somewhat unsportsmanlike and amounted to cheating.

    In fact, it was not the case at all.

    The dragon had actually stated that Chen Yun could use all available means.

    His external avatar was also one of his means and not a true independent individual.

    Therefore, it was certainly not cheating.

    The description of the battle just now sounds light and easy.

    In reality, one slip-up in the execution could lead to failure.

    The consequences of failure were already apparent when the second wave of the Successive Soul Suppressing Technique was broken.

    Absolutely, it would be pulverized into dust by the terrifying power of the dragon!

    Chen Yun still remembers how thrilling his heart had felt.

    At this moment, his consciousness allowed him to see the situation inside the tower.

    The dragon's incredibly large body did not shrink at all in the tower's space, as if the internal space of the tower was infinite.

    There was no change in the dragon's size; however, at this moment, the dragon's face had lost all arrogance and pride, replaced by sheer terror.

    The dragon must also know that being captured inside the tower means its life is now in the hands of others!

    “Don't kill me! Senior Daoist, don't kill me!”

    The dragon sensed Chen Yun's spiritual awareness and immediately pleaded in desperation.

    Chen Yun blinked and said, "I remember you had a very strong killing intent towards me just now."

    The dragon was indeed a bit shameless.

    Upon hearing this, the dragon flatly denied, "No! How could that be! I said I only wanted to compete with you. Why would I have a killing intent towards you? Competition comes second, friendship first; that is my principle as a dragon!"

    This statement would be hard for ghosts to believe!

    Chen Yun was not an idiot; how could he believe the dragon's words?

    Chen Yun was too lazy to bother with the dragon and didn't use the tower's built-in crushing function to kill it all at once.

    Seeing that the dragon could not escape, Chen Yun's consciousness withdrew from the tower.

    ...

    In the real world.

    As soon as Chen Yun's consciousness returned, he placed the tower into the Warehouses of Heaven Space.

    There were two main reasons why Chen Yun did not immediately kill the dragon.

    The first reason is that invading someone else's territory to steal treasure inherently puts you at a disadvantage.

    The second reason is that the dragon is a "sentient being" rather than a mindless beast, and Chen Yun naturally treats it as a human.

    In a situation where he is at a disadvantage, he finds it difficult to take such a decisive action.

    The second reason is that Chen Yun has a bit of a soft spot for talent.

    The dragon's cultivation is nothing short of astonishing, with only one step left to reach the pinnacle. It would be a shame to kill it.

    He's not sure if he can take the dragon out with him after capturing it inside the tower.

    If it's possible, Chen Yun would still like to subdue the dragon and make it his own.

    If it comes to that, Chen Yun will release the dragon before leaving the Sun-Moon Cave Paradise, to prevent its thousand-year cultivation from being wasted due to his disadvantage.

    Yes, he can release the dragon, but at the very least, it cannot threaten his own or his companions' lives.

    Indeed, Chen Yun's thoughts were along these lines.

    "Mr. Chen."

    "Mr. Chen, are you all right with your disheveled hair and beard?"

    Wu Koisu, Qin Ming, and the Dragon Girl Sanjiu rushed over to gather around.

    Especially Wu Koisu, despite Chen Yun already removing the dragon from his path and allowing him to retrieve the Silver Dragon Spear, he didn't rush to go but instead approached to inquire about Chen Yun's well-being.

    As everyone had seen just now, Chen Yun's soul-suppressing technique was broken, and he suddenly tilted his head back, and his hairpin snapped apart, causing his hair to fall loose all at once. It seemed he had sustained quite a bit of injury.

    Chen Yun's true essence suffered some damage, but it wasn't severe. He only needed to rest for a few days in a hidden place.

    "It's okay," he reassured everyone, "The dragon broke through the spell, and I suffered a slight backlash."

    "Phew, that's good," Wu Koisu let out a long sigh of relief.

    Qin Ming's tense expression calmed down upon hearing that Chen Yun was okay.

    He smiled and said, "Teacher, I was quite worried just now when your array was broken. I didn't expect you to raise that tower and instantly change the tide of the battle."

    The Dragon Girl Sanjiu followed up, "Yes, Mr. Chen, you have an incredible number of artifacts and treasures. Every time you face an enemy, you come up with different artifacts and treasures. I was almost going to call you the 'Multitreasure Immortal,' hahaha."

    "While artifacts and treasures may be powerful, they are useless if they cannot hit the enemy," Ding Xu carefully analyzed. "Just now, Mr. Chen used his spells to confuse the dragon and bought himself time, before using the tower to subdue it. On the surface, the process seems incredibly simple, but being able to come up with such a refined strategy in combat, where one has to act quickly and think on their feet, is truly rare. I must admit that I am not as clever as Mr. Chen; if I faced an opponent and only relied on brute force, I wouldn't be able to think of strategies like Mr. Chen does almost step by step."

    "Ha ha, who isn't like that?"

    "Don't you think anyone can be as wise as Mr. Chen?"

    "I saw Mr. Chen's Qinglong Chuxue Zhen being broken and I was terrified, but thankfully, Mr. Chen had a follow-up move to immediately subdue the dragon."

    "Mr. Chen, every time you strike, it's as if it's impossible to fathom."

    Gao Chen, Xu Yang, Zhang Ling, and other companions kept praising.

    Listening to the praise of others, Chen Yun felt a sense of reflection in his heart.

    The Five-colored Porcelain Tower is indeed a formidable artifact.

    So strong that even he finds it hard to believe.

    It was actually able to subdue the dragon, bypassing two major realms.

    However, to be fair, the Five-colored Porcelain Tower is powerful, but it's not without its shortcomings.

    Like most artifacts and treasures, the drawback of the Five-colored Porcelain Tower is that it needs to hit the target to be effective.

    If it fails to hit its target, then this artifact is useless.

    However, the Five-colored Porcelain Tower has one advantage over other artifacts and treasures.

    For example, the "Treasure Seal for Capturing Spirits" that Chen Yun had previously obtained is quite complicated to operate. Although it can also overshoot and kill in a higher realm with a hit, its hit and the Five-colored Porcelain Tower are different. The hit must be real.

    That means the red light released by the "Treasure Seal for Capturing Spirits" must strike someone else's body to take effect.

    Similarly, other artifacts and treasures are also like this.

    The Five-colored Porcelain Tower is not like this; it has a locking function.

    As long as Chen Yun can take advantage of the locking function of the Five-colored Porcelain Tower to hold the enemy in place, even if the enemy has myriad methods to escape, it will be very difficult for them to break free.

    For example, just now when the dragon changed back to its true form, the power of most artifacts or treasures might be broken immediately, but the Five-colored Porcelain Tower did not.

    It tightly locked onto the enemy, regardless of whether the enemy expanded or contracted, it still drew the enemy into itself.

    This locking function is very strong!

    Strong enough to make one shiver, after all, it represents that the enemy cannot escape!

    These thoughts whirled through his mind.

    Chen Yun smiled and waved his hand, "Alright, don't praise me too much. Otherwise, I might become arrogant and float up to the sky."

    His words were quite witty, and everyone couldn't help but laugh.

    Saying that, Chen Yun looked at Wu Koisu, "Master Wu, since the dragon has been subdued by me, you should quickly go to the bottom of the water to retrieve the treasure so as not to cause further delays and complications."

    Wu Koisu quickly replied, "Yes, I understand."

    After speaking, he turned and leapt into the water.

    Qin Ming, Dragon Girl Sanjiu, Ding Xu, and others were about to chat with Chen Yun for a few more sentences.

    Suddenly, the shark king and shark warriors all leaped over.

    As soon as the shark king landed, he immediately bowed with both fists and said, "Honorable sirs, I have not been able to repay your great kindness of saving the maiden before. I am not sure if you are free now, but if possible, I would like to invite you to our shark palace for a talk."

    Upon hearing this, Chen Yun turned his head to look.

    From a surface level, it seems that the shark tribe has no ill will towards themselves and their companions. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been prepared to cooperate with them in fighting the dragon earlier.

    But times change.

    He had just used such a powerful artifact as the Five-colored Porcelain Tower.

    Who knows if they won't remember and trick us into their lair, where they can kill and loot us?

    Wealth and treasure move people, this is the eternal truth of human development.

    Of course, Chen Yun needed to think it over.

    Just then, he couldn't help but covet the dragon grass that belonged to the other side.

    After all, it was the main ingredient for the upgraded version of the 'Essence and Spiritization Soup'.

    Currently, he was missing three herbs for the upgraded 'Refining Essence to Qi' soup, and dragon grass was one of them.

    If he could obtain dragon grass and collect the remaining two missing herbs, he could then complete the upgraded 'Refining Essence to Qi' soup.

    By then, if he consumed the spirit elixir, striving to become a high-level mage should not be too difficult, and it would likely help him quickly advance his cultivation.

    So, Chen Yun was once again tempted and wanted to befriend the shark king to find an opportunity to negotiate for the dragon grass in exchange for something.

    On the one hand, he worried about safety issues.

    On the other hand, he also wanted to obtain the precious dragon grass.

    Whether to go or not to the shark palace as a guest was a dilemma for him.

    Chen Yun did not immediately respond to the shark king's invitation but stood there, carefully considering the pros and cons, weighing whether they should accept the invitation.

    (The end of this chapter)