Chapter 907: The Wondrous Uses of a Divine Treasure
Six Soul-Swallowing Birds charged in total.
Their momentum was like six sovereigns attacking as one, and they stirred up monstrous, explosive thunder and lightning.
Yuan Linning?didn’t even have time to think; she immediately drew her Dao Sword. She was acting on pure combat instincts.
But before she could attack—
Clang!!
The hum of a sword resounded from within the floating green-skinned gourd.
It was like the sound of the Grand Dao reverberated across the ages, emanating supreme and unsurpassed sword pressure.
Heaven and earth were instantly still, frozen like a landscape painting.
Yuan Linning’s sword let out a low wail, as if in submission.
In the sky, the six charging Soul-Swallowing Birds froze in place. It seemed they’d suffered an enormous shock.
Su Yi, however, casually opened his right hand, then swiped his left pointer finger across the simple, unadorned bronze page.
Whoosh~
It was as if he’d opened a mysterious divine tome.
The page was thin as a cicada’s wing gave rise to beam after beam of mysterious light. It was as if the moon and stars were floating within it, alongside all manner of phenomena. They disappeared as quickly as they arose, each gone in a flash. Then there were yao, demons, ghosts, and monsters. All manner of apparitions flashed by…
Then, one of these beams of light transformed into a blank page and froze in place.
Boom!
Practically simultaneously, the six Soul-Swallowing Birds in the distance let out miserable shrieks, and they beat their wings like mad. But a formless power was suppressing them, and they couldn’t even struggle.
A blink of an eye later, they transformed into six bundles of light and shot into the blank page.
Kcch kcch kccch!
The blank page quivered as six lifelike depictions of Soul-Swallowing Birds appeared on its surface.
A light of strange, contorted Dao Markings floated into view as well. They read: "Soul-Swallowing Birds, a type of malevolent departed soul born of Netherworld Hell Thunder. They delight in devouring the soul essence of living things, and their awareness is muddled….”
The strange writing was a description of the Soul-Swallowing Birds: their origins, disposition, weaknesses, strengths… everything was included.
Then, Su Yi closed his hand.
Whoosh~
The strange lights firing out of the bronze page and the illusory scenes disappeared. The page returned to its former unadorned, simple state.
This was the Book of Diting, the treasure born alongside the sacred beast guardian of the Infernal Palace, the Xiantian Divine Lifeform Diting.
It was also the supreme divine artifact of the Night Watchmen!
This treasure had been used to suppress the world’s evil spirits throughout the ages!
“They’re… gone… just like that!?” Yuan Linning couldn’t have been any more shocked, and she couldn’t help but stutter.
The sword hum emanating from within the gourd had set her heart trembling, as if she’d been plunged into an icy abyss.
But the six Soul-Swallowing Birds’ simultaneous defeat left her simply dumbstruck. Her mind was completely blank. She couldn’t even imagine how anything so unbelievable could have happened in this world.
Su Yi smiled. If I couldn’t even achieve that, I’d bring shame upon the Tiny Heart of the Cosmos and the Book of Diting.
Of course, with his current cultivation, he couldn’t bring out either treasure’s full power. Still, the treasures’ own power was enough to achieve quite a bit.
When he last visited the Ancestral Forbidden Ground of the Ghost Serpents, the humming of the Tiny Heart of the Cosmos had almost thrown Torchlit Darkness Mountain’s power into disarray, and it placed an enormous amount of pressure on the incomparably fierce Profound Serenity Realm old butcher.
Of course it could do the same to six Soul-Swallowing Birds!
Sure, the sword hum could at most intimidate his foes; he couldn’t truly kill his enemies with it.
But combined with the power of the Book of Diting, it was enough to let him take down the Soul-Swallowing Birds with ease.
Simply put, the Tiny Heart of the Cosmos could intimidate and suppress opponents, giving the Book of Diting?an opportunity to capture and imprison them.
The two complimented each other. Together, they were too wondrous for words.
But Su Yi was doing this out of necessity.
At the end of the day, his cultivation base was far too weak. Both the Tiny Heart of the Cosmos and the Book of Diting?were Xiantian Dao Weapons that would have dazzled any era they’d appeared in.
Never mind ordinary Emperors, even Profound Serenity Emperors wouldn’t have been able to draw out the full extent of their power.
Were Su Yi’s cultivation base strong enough to draw out their full power, he wouldn’t have needed their help to deal with a flock of Soul-Swallowing Birds.
Weng!
In the distant skies, the green-skinned gourd seemed to have eaten its fill. It swayed, then shrank back down to three inches and fell into Su Yi’s palm.
By now, Yuan Linning?had calmed down somewhat.
Even if she couldn’t wrap her head around it, she had to accept a certain fact: Su Yi hadn’t just gathered a portion of Netherworld Hell Thunder. He’d even suppressed six Soul-Swallowing Birds with casual, understated ease!
This implied that the so-called uncrossable Cliffs of Overwhelming Sorrow couldn’t possibly stop them.
“Let’s go.” Su Yi hung the gourd at his waist once more. It looked like a decoration, and it wasn’t at all eye-catching.
From beginning to end, he was calm and composed, as if what he’d done was too trivial to be worth mentioning.
Yuan Linning couldn’t help but ask, “Fellow Daoist Su, that treasure of yours is so wondrous, yet you wear it openly. Aren’t you worried that someone will steal it?”
“No one can steal it from me,” Su Yi said casually. As he spoke, he was already walking into the distance.
Yuan Linning?hurried after him.
She stared intently at the little gourd hanging from Su Yi’s waist, as if trying to discern its secrets.
But the gourd now seemed entirely unremarkable, without the slightest trace of an unusual aura. This made it difficult to imagine that such a limitlessly terrifying word hum had emanated from it mere moments prior.
I guess this is what they mean when they say true treasures are understated, thought Yuan Linning.
Suddenly, Su Yi said, “Don’t tell anyone what happened today. I’m not afraid of anything, but it could implicate you.”
Yuan Linning?was instantly solemn, and she nodded. “Fellow Daoist, please rest assured. I won’t breathe a word of this!”
As an Empress, she naturally wasn’t stupid. She understood that loose lips led to disaster.
After crossing the Cliffs of Overwhelming Sorrow, an enormous river entered their field of view.
It was ten thousand feet across, and the water was an unsettling black. Countless skeletons floated within the surging current, and the bone-laden waters stretched out as far as the eye could see!
The Great White Bone River!
It flowed directly adjacent to the perilous Cliffs of Overwhelming Sorrow. The innumerable corpses floating in its waters belonged to the experts who’d died here over the years.
A terrifying variety of evil spirits lurked in the riverbed: Silverflame Bone Devils. They were similar to the Netherworld Corpse Worms in that they attacked en masse. They weren’t all that strong, but they contained a toxin potent enough to infiltrate an Emperor’s blood and qi, damaging their vitality. It was as insidious as could be.
However, this wasn’t much of a threat to Su Yi.
Whoosh!
He gripped the Book of Diting?in his right hand and exerted his will. A Soul-Swallowing Bird immediately flew from the page.
Yuan Linning?was instantly alarmed, but she quickly realized that it wasn’t at all vicious. No, it was effectively a puppet. It obediently closed its winds and knelt at Su Yi’s feet.
The Soul-Swallowing Bird had obviously already been dominated!
“Let’s go.” A moment later, Su Yi led Yuan Linning onto the bird’s back, and they soared toward the opposite shore of the Great White Bone River.
The river’s black waters churned, and countless skeletons bobbed up and down. Barely discernible, vicious, insidious presences darted about beneath the surface.
The Silverflame Bone Devils.
But as the Soul-Swallowing Bird took to the skies, the Silverflame Bone Devils sensed a threat. All of them retreated into the riverbed, not daring to poke out their heads.
“So, the Soul-Swallowing Birds’ auras are enough to intimidate the Silverflame Bone Devils.” Yuan Linning could feel her horizons broadening, but Su Yi was already accustomed to such things.
Every living thing had weaknesses to exploit.
When you killed a snake, you aimed for the spot seven inches behind its head. When you fired an arrow, you aimed for the throat.
On the path of cultivation, no matter how terrifying your opponent was, so long as you could discern the nature of their abilities, you could use all manner of methods to defeat them with ease.
When a butcher prepared a carcass, he could dissect an entire steer with ease, even with his eyes closed. This was in part because he was familiar with his craft, but also in no small part because he knew a cow’s anatomy like the back of his hand.
In his past life, Su Yi was known as the Master of Ten Thousand Daos, and he’d explored the City of the Wrongfully Dead before. How could he be ignorant of the terrifying inhabitants of its forbidden grounds?
When cultivating and seeking the Dao, one ought to comprehend heaven and earth, and discern the nature of everything in them. Only then could one achieve the level of “drawing upon all of creation at will”!
……
They crossed the Great White Bone River and proceeded for a little less than ten minutes before a blood-red landscape came into view.
Heaven and earth were smeared a bloody red. The sight was unsettling.
An ancient black city towered amidst the blood-red landscape.
Clusters of jade will-o-wisps floated throughout the massive city, like countless oil lamps. Departed souls of all shapes and sizes wandered throughout the area, like mindless wooden puppets.
Anyone who saw this would feel as if they’d entered a terrifying and sinister ghostly domain.
“Is that the Little Necropolis?” Yuan Linning?felt an inexplicable sense of oppression.
“That’s right.” Su Yi nodded.
“Rumor has it that the Little Necropolis is one of the nine most dangerous places in the City of the Wrongfully Dead. They say that here, even Profound Serenity Emperors face almost certain doom. Fellow Daoist, might I ask why you’ve come here?” Yuan Linning?couldn’t stop herself from asking.
“There are a few things I’d like to ask about,” said Su Yi. As he spoke, he put away the Soul-Swallowing Bird and drifted to the ground.
He gazed at the distant Little Necropolis, hands behind his back. His brow gradually furrowed.
Given the Heavenspan Yao Vine’s disposition, how could it tolerate so many departed souls wandering this close to the city?
It’s been tens of thousands of years. Has this place long since changed hands?
Su Yi thought for a moment, then slipped a jade bottle from his sleeves. It sealed a portion of the power of the Dark Laws of Purgatory. Po Suo had refined it from the remains of the Dark King of Purgatory back in Ziluo City.
Kcch! Su Yi flicked his fingertip, undoing the seal. A wisp of the sinister power of purgatory surged out of the bottle.
“Take control of this portion of the power of the Laws and use it to obscure us. That way, the departed souls won’t notice us, and we can slip into the Little Necropolis undetected,” ordered Su Yi.
His cultivation base restricted him, and he couldn’t possibly control the power of the Laws on his own.
But Yuan Linning?was an Empress; she could naturally do it. She hurriedly got to work.
Whoosh~
Before long, the Dark Laws of Purgatory enveloped them like fog.
Su Yi then led the way toward the city towering amidst the blood-red landscape.
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