Chapter 118: Crimson Fire Mine Island

“Seizing other unclaimed islands?” Chang Fei finally realized Ye Mo’s next plan. The city defenses and internal constructions of the Immortal Village were largely complete—it was time to expand their territory.

“Our Ye Clan Immortal Village currently has almost no income. To earn spirit stones quickly, we must find spiritual resources in the Ao Lai Archipelago,” Ye Mo explained.

“Gao Jian, stay behind to guard the village. Chang Fei, prepare the ships and crew. I will take the Five Earth Slaves and set sail to explore the nearby unclaimed islands within several hundred miles to see if we can find spiritual resources,” Ye Mo ordered after a brief moment of thought.

“Shouldn’t we take more people along? What if we encounter danger?” Gao Jian hesitated.

“There are no demonic beasts above the fourth rank in these waters. What danger could there be? The village still has construction tasks needing manpower; there’s no need to bring too many,” Ye Mo smiled. “Besides, I just broke through to the mid Qi Refining stage, my strength has reached two thousand jin. With a triple slash technique, even third-rank demonic beasts can’t harm me. I’m not afraid of that third-rank Golden Feather Giant Eagle we encountered earlier.”

“Yes, I’ll arrange it immediately,” Chang Fei responded and hurried off.

The Ye Clan’s Spirit Island was quite large, and it might contain various mineral resources underground. However, exploring deep mineral veins wasn’t easy. Unless one dug painstakingly with a refined iron ore shovel, there was no way to know where the veins lay. Even then, the effort might be futile. Some mineral veins were buried tens or hundreds of zhang beneath the surface, making them hard to detect without genuine exploration techniques.

Qingyun Immortal City had specialized mineral-exploring cultivators whose methods were highly effective, but hiring them was costly—often requiring a share of the discovered mineral veins.

Thinking of this, Ye Mo felt a bit frustrated. However, there was no rush to explore the Ye Clan’s own island; it wouldn’t go anywhere. He decided to first scout the surrounding unclaimed islands and try to occupy the better ones nearby.

Now that the Ye Clan Immortal Village was on track without requiring his constant attention, it was time to explore the islands.

The Ao Lai Archipelago had over a thousand islands, large and small. Within a thousand miles around Ye Clan’s main island, nearly ten unclaimed “wild islands” remained. Compared to Ye Clan Spirit Island, these wild islands were either too small or lacked spiritual woods and plains, making them unsuitable for building immortal villages.

Ye Mo stood on the bow deck of the ship, gazing at a peculiar island ahead. It had peaks and many shrubs but lacked tall trees. Large areas of bare rock were visible, and hot springs emitted continuous plumes of smoke, suggesting high temperatures.

The Five Earth Slaves silently stood behind and beside Ye Mo as his escort.

“Lord of the city, this island is over thirty li long and more than twenty li wide. There’s one place barely suitable for docking. Shall we go ashore to investigate?” Chang Fei circled the wild island with the ship and asked.

“Yes, let’s go ashore and hope for some findings,” Ye Mo nodded gently.

He had already explored two wild islands in a row, finding only some spiritual wood but no other gains. This was expected; valuable resources didn’t appear easily. Ye Mo was mentally prepared.

At the command, sailors adjusted the ship’s course toward a suitable shore.

A giant spirit wood plank several zhang long was placed at the shore as a makeshift dock.

“I’ll take A Jin, A Mu, and the others to explore. You stay here and watch,” Ye Mo instructed Chang Fei.

Ye Mo had given the Five Earth Slaves new names based on the Five Elements: A Jin (Metal), A Mu (Wood), A Shui (Water), A Huo (Fire), and A Tu (Earth). A Shui was the only female among them.

“Yes,” Chang Fei nodded and stayed with the sailors to guard the ship and provide backup if needed.

Ye Mo and the Five Earth Slaves disembarked.

The wild island was not small, about half the size of Ye Clan Spirit Island. However, the lack of abundant forests made it unsuitable for building an immortal village.

A Jin led the way with a refined iron spirit sword, clearing a path through the tangled shrubs.

Ye Mo walked alongside, observing the plants in the thicket.

“There are actually a few low-grade spiritual herbs here. If we clear out the demonic beasts on the island, people could come to harvest these herbs,” Ye Mo’s eyes brightened. He carefully extracted a mature, low-level spiritual herb from the bush with his spirit sword—a key ingredient for a first-rank Vital Energy Pill.

Though such low-grade herbs were scarce on the island, every single one was worth gathering.

“Poisonous snake!” A Jin suddenly shouted.

A Tu and A Mu, guarding at Ye Mo’s sides, immediately rushed over to assist, while A Shui and A Huo remained in place.

Ye Mo looked up from digging herbs to see A Jin battling a three to four zhang-long sea snake in the bushes.

He glanced briefly and lost interest, continuing to search for herbs.

The snake was ordinary, likely only mid-level martial artist strength.

A Jin was already a Qi Refining stage cultivator and could easily handle the beast alone.

Sure enough, within a few breaths, A Jin slew the sea snake with his refined iron spirit sword and dragged it, along with A Tu and A Mu, back to Ye Mo.

Such a large sea snake provided enough meat to feed all six of them for several meals.

They wasted nothing, lighting a campfire in the bushes to roast the snake into delicious meat.

After searching the bushes for over two hours, the six finally emerged into a scattered mountainous area.

Ye Mo climbed a small hilltop and scanned the surroundings.

Behind them lay dense shrubs; ahead were rolling hills with less vegetation, exposed rocks, and even smoke rising from some spots.

“Let’s continue forward and see if we can find any spiritual creatures,” Ye Mo told the Five Earth Slaves.

Finding spiritual treasures on a wild island without special detection methods was mostly luck.

Though small, the island’s terrain was complex.

They spent a full day trekking across it.

That night, the six camped beside some rocks.

Ye Mo settled on a dry spot while A Shui went to fetch water and the others gathered firewood.

“Master, I found a piece of red stone that’s strange. Holding it makes me feel heat—it should contain fire spiritual energy,” A Shui soon returned, carrying a water pouch in one hand and a red stone in the other, reporting with a puzzled expression.

“A bright red stone containing strong fire spiritual energy,” Ye Mo was startled as he took it and examined it carefully. Soon a look of delight spread across his face. “This is red fire ore, the primary mineral for forging fire-element spirit swords. A Shui, where did you find this?”

“Near the water source,” A Shui replied promptly.

“Let’s go check it out,” Ye Mo immediately stood up. Red fire ore was a high-value mineral, even more precious than refined iron ore.

A Shui led Ye Mo to the other side of the mountain peak, behind a large rock.

“Master, I was fetching water here when I accidentally found this red ore in the water. I sensed fire spiritual energy, which caught my attention.”

On the other side of the rock was a small pond, but no other red fire ore was visible in the water.

Soon, the other four Earth Slaves arrived.

Without waiting for orders, they spread out to search carefully.

Ye Mo’s cultivation had advanced to the fourth layer of Qi Refining; his divine sense now covered an impressive radius of forty zhang, allowing him to search more efficiently than all five Earth Slaves combined.

“There!” Ye Mo suddenly sensed something and dashed toward a direction.

The five Earth Slaves followed closely, worried for his safety.

“There are some scattered red fire ores here,” Ye Mo landed amidst a pile of rubble seventy to eighty zhang away, picked up a piece of red ore, confirmed it, and handed it to A Jin.

A Jin showed it to the others, and the Earth Slaves grew excited.

“Keep searching. I want to find the source,” Ye Mo’s spirit surged with excitement.

Red fire ore wouldn’t exist alone; there must be an ore vein on the island, likely near the surface, since red fire ore was found exposed.

The dark night didn’t hinder their search.

Not only Ye Mo but even the Five Earth Slaves found several pieces of red fire ore.

“Master, there’s hot wind in this valley.”

“Hot wind? Where could this wind be coming from?”

“The wind blows from that canyon over there. Let’s take a look.”

Ye Mo led the group toward a small canyon between two hills. The deeper they went, the stronger the heat became.

Soon, they stopped beside a collapsed rock within the canyon.

“There’s a large amount of red fire ore and refined iron ore here,” A Jin said cheerfully after thorough searching.

“An open-air red fire mine—fantastic!” Ye Mo surveyed the ground covered with bright red ore, smiling broadly.

The ore vein was clearly near the surface, exposed over years by wind and rain.

“Hey, there’s a small cave here,” A Shui suddenly spotted a nearby rock face.

She carefully approached and noticed heat radiating from within the cave, which also contained red fire ore.

Suddenly, a fiery red shadow shot out from the cave with a piercing scream, swiping a claw at her.

“Who’s there?” A Shui was startled, her delicate face instantly turning cold. Her refined iron spirit sword trembled in her hand as she swiftly retreated.

The fiery red shadow moved with incredible agility, dodging her sword and lunging faster than her backward steps.

“Clang!”

Ye Mo slashed a golden light that collided with the red shadow, producing a clash of metal.

The fiery shadow was forced back into the cave.

“Be careful, it’s a fire-element demonic beast dwelling in the cave,” Ye Mo said gravely. The red shadow was too fast for him to discern clearly, but he vaguely saw thick spirit armor covering its body.

The Five Earth Slaves quickly formed a formation, positioning themselves in front of Ye Mo to block the cave entrance.

“Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!”

Several fiery red shadows shot out again, attacking the Five Earth Slaves fiercely.

“Kill!” A Jin bellowed, charging forward with the others to confront the fiery shadows.

“Clang!”

Ye Mo’s golden spirit sword burst forth with radiance, striking one fiery shadow. Though it was repelled, the attack didn’t injure it. The beast landed on the ground, covered in armor, glaring fiercely at Ye Mo.

“An armadillo demon? Its defense is incredible; even the golden spirit sword can’t pierce its armor,” Ye Mo finally recognized with shock.

The golden spirit sword was renowned for its armor-piercing power.

This armadillo demon’s attacks were mediocre, but its defense was unbelievably tough.

“Master, these armadillo demons’ scales are too thick. We can’t hurt them,” A Mu reported.

“We should retreat; even if we keep fighting, we won’t defeat them. We’ll think of a way to deal with them later,” Ye Mo said, withdrawing cautiously with the Five Earth Slaves following.

The fiery shadows did not pursue them but stayed hidden in the cave, watching warily.