Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Having come to the decision that he needed to find a way to deal with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast that was in control of the current area of the valley he found himself inside of at the moment, Xuan Hao began to try and look for any weakness that he might be able to exploit in the illusory beasts. Using the countless weaker Domain Lord Realm illusory beasts present in the valley to find these weaknesses.

During this process, he also realized that the illusory beasts he had killed over the past month would reappear after a set amount of time had passed. The weaker the illusory beasts were, the faster they would reappear.

Although, during this time, only illusory beasts below the Soul Ascension Realm had appeared again. Maybe this was case he hadn't discovered this happening earlier, as he mostly focused his attention on the Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts who helped him comprehend the Dao of Illusions.

Not to mention, he still didn't get the opportunity to witness just how these illusory beasts came into existence.

Even then… He had a few guesses as to how this happened, the most logical one being that they were an amalgamation created by the white qi everywhere in the valley and something else that seemed to give them a consciousness comparable to a demon beast that had yet to reach the Nascent Soul Realm. 

Not only that, but he also began suspecting that this thing that helped the illusory beast gain a certain level of consciousness was what allowed him to comprehend the Dao of Illusions more easily after killing the illusory beasts…

As he focused his full attention on finding a weakness in the illusory beasts that he could exploit in a fight against the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast over the next month, Xuan Hao finally managed to understand the illusory beasts to the degree that he felt confident in fighting against the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beasts.

Not so much because he had managed to find a critical weakness that he would be able to exploit, but because he came to realize that the illusory beasts were dumb, dumb to the point where he felt confident in being able to trick the Peak Soul Ascension Realm demon beast to let down its guard and allow him to get close enough to fatally wound it without it getting the chance to defend.

The only thing he needed to do was reduce his cultivation base to the Domain Lord Realm and make it believe that he was just in the Domain Lord Realm.

From experimenting with other illusory beasts, he had realized that they would not use too much strength when dealing with a much weaker opponent.

The main difficulty in doing this lay in the fact that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast's soul strength was far beyond that of an ordinary Peak Soul Ascension Realm cultivator. Making tricking it into believing that he was weaker than he actually was quite a difficult thing to accomplish.

But even then, Xuan Hao felt it was worth an attempt. Even if he ended up being discovered, he was more than confident in being able to run away and leave the Valley of Illusory Beasts. Not to mention, he felt quite curious about just how strong he was compared to the illusory beast if he went all out.

Whoosh~

With this in mind, Xuan Hao slowly began approaching the hill where the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast was located. Keeping a distance from any illusory beasts along the way, as fighting them might end up alerting the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast, something that was easier said than done considering that the illusory beasts surrounding the hill with the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast on top of it had all reached the Soul Ascension Realm.

The one positive thing was their strength didn't exceed the Second Tribulation of the Soul Ascension Realm. Even if it took some extra time and effort on his part, he eventually managed to sneak past them.

"I hope this works…" Standing no more than a few thousand meters away from the large hill that the Peak Soul Ascension Realm illusory beast was located, Xuan Hao lowered his cultivation base to the Domain Lord Realm before beginning to move towards the hill.

Roar-!

Not even a second after doing this, a loud roar echoed out from the top of the hill as a large illusory beast appeared at the top of the hill staring directly down towards him. Just from its presence alone, it was obvious that it was far stronger than any of the illusory beasts that he had encountered so far.

Whoosh~

However, even with the illusory beast appearing, Xuan Hao didn't hesitate in continuing to move towards the hill.

The main reason for this was simple, the illusory beast had not managed to see through his disguise!

If it had really seen through the fact that he was concealing his true strength and was not someone at the Domain Lord Realm, it wouldn't have just casually appeared at the top of the hill and roared at him. Instead, it would have attacked him without giving him a chance to get any closer.

After all, even if the illusory beasts weren't especially weak when it came to close combat, they still preferred to fight at a distance where they would have more than enough time to utilize the Dao of Illusions.

Roar? 

Seeing Xuan Hao still approaching even after it had appeared, the illusory beast could not help tilting its head in confusion. Not understanding why, a weak creature in the Domain Lord Realm still dared to approach it after it had flaunted its strength.

Considering the obvious difference in strength between them, it had expected him to either freeze in fear or just outright run away.

This difference between what was happening and what it expected to happen momentarily caused it to stare down at Xuan Hao in confusion.

The main reason why something like this could even happen was due to the simple fact that the illusory beast didn't really view Xuan Hao as a possible threat due to only perceiving him as someone in the Domain Lord Realm

By the time it decided to take action to kill him, it only used a simple soul attack that was only strong enough to kill someone in the earlier stages of the Soul Ascension Realm. Although strong enough to kill someone in the Domain Lord Realm, it was far from enough to do anything to Xuan Hao.

Roar!?

For this reason, Xuan Hao managed to make it halfway up the hill before the illusory beast figured out that something was wrong… Of course, it was already too late at that point in time, as Xuan Hao was more than close enough to instantly close the distance between them-

Swish-!

And doing just that, Xuan Hao appeared directly in front of the still confused illusory beast. Wasting no time to in using his Dao of Ice to slow down the illusory beast to slow down any response from the illusory beast, while also using his dao domain to strengthen his sword as he cut into the confused illusory beast before it had any time to muster a proper defense.

ROOOOAR!

A split second after the sword managed to pierce into the somewhat soft and cloudlike body of the illusory beast, the illusory beast finally realized what had happened as it rapidly retreated before Xuan Hao's sword could do any more damage-

Whoosh-!

Of course, Xuan Hao had already expected this as he chased after the retreating illusory beast without slowing down his attack in the slightest. Knowing very well that he would lose his initiative if he gave the illusory beast the chance to retreat and attack from a distance using the Dao of Illusions.

The injurie he had managed to inflict on the illusory beast so far was far from enough to give him any real advantage in a fight if the illusory beast could keep him at a distance and prevent any new injures, something Xuan Hao was doing his absolute best at trying to stop from happening as he relentlessly attacked the retreating illusory beast.

Ptsh-!

Due to this, it did not take long before Xuan Hao managed to properly wound the retreating illusory beast, causing its strength to decrease as it did its best to put a stop to the rampaging energies that infiltrated its body through the wound and were causing no small amount of damage.

In turn, this caused the illusory beast to no longer have the ability to properly fight back against Xuan Hao. Resulting in even more injuries that weakened it even further.

By the time that the fight had been going on for a minute and the illusory beast finally managed to fight back against Xuan Hao's constant onslaught, its strength had already been reduced down to a level that was comparable to the Fifth Tribulation of the Soul Ascension…