Chapter 2113 Daoist Chu Awakens
"Daoist Chu," Lin Mu spoke, helping the man sit up.
"Daoist Mu Lin? What…" The man seemed to be a bit disoriented. "Why are you… here?" it was clear that Daoist Chu hadn't come to terms with his location yet.
"You're out of the Trial grounds." Lin Mu clarified for the mans.
"Out?" Daoist Chu furrowed his brows before his eyes went wide. "THE GATE!" he said out loud, feeling agitated.
He swiveled his neck to look around, before spotting Lady Kang some distance from him and Min Ju lying next to him. "We really are out." Daoist Chu said while taking a deep breath.
The then checked his body finding it to be in a good condition other than the clothes that were damaged. "Huh, I'm healed?" Daoist Chu titled his head in confusion. "But the first trial didn't heal us upon passing." He muttered.
"Lady Kang healed you." Lin Mu clarified for him.
"Ah! I'm indebted to Lady Kang." Daoist Chu hurriedly cupped his hands in gratitude, causing Lady Kang to open her eyes too. "It's fine. We're all in this together." Lady Kang spoke. "We literally wouldn't be able to get out, if anyone died." She added.
"What do you mean?" But this only served to alarm the man. "Daoist Chu, did you two gather the keys?" Lin Mu asked.
"Of course! The iron keys!" Daoist Chu recalled the thing they had almost died for.
~SHUA~SHUA~SHUA~
Ten keys appeared in his hands in the next moment, which were visible to the others.
"Ten?" Lin Mu furrowed his brows. "You only got these many?" he asked.
"Yes… it took us a long time to find all of them. We barely managed to escape the place by the skin of our teeth… If Min Ju hadn't thrown herself at the key to protect it, the iron key might just have been shattered by the ice beasts." Daoist Chu replied.
"Tell us more… what happened in your trial?" Lady Kang asked, wanting to know the details.
"Is she fine," Daoist Chu asked before glancing at Min Ju who was still sleeping. "Haa~ That's good… I wouldn't have been able to survive this without her." Daoist Chu stated. "I have to admit, Miss Min Ju certainly exceeds me in terms of experience." He spoke.
"Oh?" Lin Mu was intrigued.
"It was her wits that allowed us to figure out how to get out, as well as how to find the keys." Daoist Chu stated before narrating his entire experience.
Lin Mu and Lady Kang listened intently, learning that Daoist Chu and Min Ju ended up in what looked like a frozen wasteland.
There was snow everywhere with a dark grey sky that swirled with scathing cold winds. Mountains honed by sharp winds dotted the land, with peaks that reached high up into the sky. This made the two think they had ended up in an illusory realm at first, but it was soon proven to be much more than that when they couldn't fly.
This made it much difficult for them than the previous trial which had already exhausted them to no extent. The Trial of Persistence was very taxing on their bodies and they had been constantly using Immortal Stones as well as Qi restoration pills to carry the thorough the trial.
They had also sustained many injuries during it all, and had tough times during the end of the first trial but managed to survive it with both their skills combined.
The illusory beasts were not that problematic to them in the first trial, as it was the numbers that exhausted them for the most part.
But in the Second Trial, when they ended up facing beasts that could continually regenerate, things began to go downhill.
Since they were already exhausted from the start, and landed in a frozen wasteland, their recovery became difficult. The cold air there contained Icy Qi that made it difficult for them to recover Immortal Qi normally.
Whenever they tried to absorb it form the air, it would also try to infiltrate their bodies. This would be a godsend for those that cultivated Yin or cold cultivation techniques for someone like Mei Nienzhen, but in the case of Daoist Chu and Min Ju it was not the case.
None of their cultivation techniques were orientated towards that and it only ended up becoming a hindrance. They had to put extra effort in recovering their Qi and spent the first week hiding while they got better.
The second week onwards, they went out exploring and came across their first ice beast that was in the form of a wolf.
It was fully composed out of ice, and was almost transparent.
The two of course, had no issues in fighting it and managed to shatter it with just a couple of attacks. But they had no idea that the beast would just recover within moments. They attacked it again, but it recovered once more.
This repeated for over ten times, before one of this hits seemingly struck the energy core and killed the beast for sure.
This let the two know that there was a specific method to kill the beasts, but they didn't know the weakness yet.
An entire week passed before they managed to sense the energy cores of the beasts there. But even then, it wasn't easy as the numbers of the ice beasts continued to increase.
The more there were, the harder it was to determine where their energy cores was.
Time continued to pass and the two struggled through it all before they finally found their first key hiding on top of a Snow clad peak.
It was guarded by snow tigers that regenerated constantly too.
Learning that the iron keys were the clue to exiting it all, Min Ju started to guide Daoist Chu until the very end, when they found the tenth key and leaped through the Teleportation gate.