Chapter 974 - Enraged
“I feel like there’s something not quite right about the Heaven-Illuminating Edict,” the middle-aged man in the feather headdress said gravely.
The crowd couldn’t help but feel bewildered.
Gu Ziming furrowed his brow. “Fellow Daoist Lu, have you discovered a problem?”
The middle-aged man in the headdress was called Lu Qingqu, and he was from the Wilds Dragon Tiger Dao Mountain. He’d carved that Heaven-Illuminating Edict there personally.
Lu Qingqu said gravely, “Please permit me to inspect it.”
His eyes flashed with golden light as he gazed intently at the Heaven-Illuminating Edict in the distance.
After scrutinizing it for a while, he couldn’t help but furrow his brows in confusion. “The Edict’s power hasn’t changed, but… but…”
Gu Ziming was starting to run out of patience. “What’s with all the stuttering? Speak directly.”
Lu Qingqu took a deep breath and said in a bit of a daze, “I feel that the charm and power contained in the Edict is superior to when I carved it, as if… it’s become stronger than before…”
The crowd was stunned. What’s that supposed to mean?
Gu Ziming was stunned too. “Is it that the Heaven-Illuminating Edict has absorbed the power of the Laws within the Divine Cave of the Six Paths? Could that have produced this change?”
Lu Qingqu shook his head slightly. “It’s hard to say.”
“What’s with all the confusion? That the Heaven-Illuminating Edict remains is proof that there are no problems with this path,” a middle-aged man in gray said dismissively.
As he spoke, he walked right up to the entryway, then walked back and forth, examining it for a moment before turning to face the group. He laughed, “I told you! There’s nothing wrong with it. Quick, let’s begin our operation.”
Gu Ziming and the others nodded.
But before they could get started, their expressions shifted dramatically.
Deep within the cave, a bloody, skeletal hand appeared silently and out of nowhere, then grabbed the man in gray.
“Save me—!!”
The man in gray was scared out of his wits, but before he could even struggle, the enormous skeletal hand dragged him into the cave’s depths and disappeared without a trace.
All that remained were the desperate, terrified screams still echoing through the air.
This sudden development sent chills down Gu Ziming and his companions’ spines, and their faces paled.
“What…. What’s going on?” someone asked in a quavering voice.
That middle-aged man in gray was a late-stage Profound Illumination Emperor of Nine-Star Sword Mountain!
But he didn’t even have time to struggle before a strange, bloody, skeletal hand dragged him off!
“Just as I thought… there really is a problem with the Heaven-Illuminating Edict!” Lu Qingqu had an unsightly expression on his face. “If I’m not mistaken, someone erased the Heaven-Illuminating Edict I carved, then placed another, identical Edict on a different entrance!”
This declaration provoked a series of gasps.
“Dammit! Someone tricked us!” Someone cursed, an extremely nasty look on their face. “That’s simply too insidious and despicable!”
“Brother Lu, the Heaven-Illuminating Edict is a unique, untransmittable legacy of your Dragon Tiger Dao Mountain. How could anyone in the Netherworld possibly know how to carve it?” someone asked with a frown.
Lu Qingqu shook his head. “That’s the part I can’t wrap my head around either.”
But then, Gu Ziming suddenly seemed to understand something, and his eyes flashed. “If I’m not mistaken, the target we’ve been waiting for got here ahead of us. He’s entered the Divine Cave of the Six Paths already!”
The crowd was stunned.
“Senior Apprentice Brother Lu, are you talking about that young Spiritual Revolution Realm cultivator?” Shangguan Jie couldn’t help but ask.
“That’s right. I’m talking about him.” Gu Ziming nodded.
“Fellow Daoist Gu, are you saying that he’s the one who left the Heaven-Illuminating Edict?” Lu Qingqu found this difficult to believe.
Gu Ziming’s expression shifted inscrutably. “To the best of my knowledge, he is indeed capable of that.”
The crowd found it increasingly difficult to keep their cool.
“Senior Apprentice Brother Gu, don’t tell me you already know that person’s origins?” asked Shangguan Jie.
Gu Ziming said gravely, “You’ll understand soon, but right now, we have to find that safe path as soon as possible and hurry into the Divine Cave of the Six Paths. If I’m not mistaken, that guy has already arrived at the bronze temple!”
He then looked at Lu Qingqu. “Fellow Daoist, I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you again.”
Earlier, it was Lu Qingqu who’d used a secret ability to discover the one safe path.
“Got it.” Lu Qingqu nodded.
……
The depths of the Divine Cave of the Six Paths.
It was an utterly enormous space, with steep mountains on all sides. Their towering slopes connected heaven and earth. Standing here, humans seemed as tiny and insignificant as ants.
A vast, ancient bronze temple stood in the center of this enormous cave.
Thick, black, densely-packed divine chains descended from the mountains and surrounded the temple on all sides. Each chain was wrapped in the strange, inscrutable power of the Laws, and they emanated misty, dim gray light. They were mysterious and imposing.
Thousands of interwoven black chains thoroughly enveloped the bronze temple. From a distance, it was quite a shocking sight.
A thousand-foot ritual ground stood before the temple. A thirty-foot-wide, perfectly straight path connected the ritual grounds to the bronze temple’s main doors.
When Su Yi arrived here and took in this familiar scenery, he couldn’t help but look a bit dazed. This place was just as he'd left it. It was like a prison for deities, and it hadn’t changed in the slightest.
But before long, Su Yi’s gaze turned serious.
A single bronze rack stood within the thousand-foot ritual grounds. A thin man with disheveled hair was bound upon it, covered in blood and countless wounds. Although his smeared blood and disheveled hair obscured his face, Su Yi recognized him at a glance.
The old blind man!!
Su Yi furrowed his brow, and the depths of his gaze shone with intimidating light.
They’d parted ways in Ziluo City, when the old blind man left for the Ghost Lantern Sarcophagus Bearers’ ancestral ground.
Su Yi would never have guessed that before even finding the old rooster, he’d reunite with the old blind man in the Burial Ground of the Dao!
“It seems that I’m the person the Abstruse Force Alliance is after…” Su Yi’s expression was as calm and tranquil as ever. However, his gaze was increasingly deep and inscrutable.
He walked over to the ritual grounds and stared intently at the old blind man. The old blind man had long since fallen unconscious. Blood-red chains, each as thick as a thumb, ran right through his shoulders, waist, and legs, binding him firmly in place.
He’d obviously undergone brutal torture; his flesh was in tatters, and his skin was smeared with blood. His life force had waned, and he was extremely feeble.
Su Yi took all of this in, and his heart welled with irrepressible murderous intent.
However, he didn’t rush to save the old blind man. He could tell that the blood-rain chains tying him to the rack were emblazoned with an utterly insidious, corrosive energy, like a small-scale formation. If he touched them, the old blind man would instantly suffer the resulting backlash.
Su Yi thought for a moment, then took out a bottle of recovery medicine he’d kept in reserve. He ground one of the pills into powder, then flicked his finger.
The fine powder landed all over the old blind man’s body, its touch as gentle as beams of light. Wherever it landed, the old blind man’s wounds knit together at speeds visible to the naked eye.
“Old blind man,” Su Yi said. His voice was soft, but it boomed like morning bells or evening drums, with a wondrous quality that echoed directly throughout the old blind man’s soul.
Before long, the old blind man quivered from head to toe and regained consciousness. He raised his head with great difficulty, and his hollow sockets turned toward Su Yi.
A moment later, he seemed to emerge from his muddled state, and he said excitedly, “Your… Your Excellency Su!?”
His voice was hoarse and incomparably weak.
He tried to struggle, but the blood-red chains lit up and burst with terrifying, destructive power. They whipped his flesh. The pain was so immense that he couldn’t help but let out a low, muffled grunt.
“Don’t move,” Su Yi said softly. “Once I’ve gotten rid of these chains, I’ll get you out of here.”
But the old blind man suddenly realized something, and he said hoarsely, “Your Excellency Su, run away! Quickly! Don’t mind me! They’ve set a trap here, and you’re the one they’re after!”
He sounded utterly frantic.
Su Yi said calmly, “I realized that the moment I laid eyes on you. It seems I’ve implicated you yet again.”
As he spoke, he pressed his fingers into a sword, then slashed over ten times in rapid succession.
Crunch! Crack! Crack!
The blood-red chains binding the old blind man fell apart, one after another.
The newly freed old blind man staggered and almost fell before Su Yi caught him.
“Your Excellency! I… I let you down….” The old blind man’s face filled with guilt and shame, and he said in a quavering voice, “After they captured me, they tortured me. I wanted to end my life, but I couldn’t even do that. Instead, they bound me completely and searched my soul… I, I don’t know how much they learned, but…”
Su Yi said softly, “So long as you’re still alive, none of that matters. Come on, I’m getting you out of here.”
From beginning to end, his expression had been calm, with little emotion. However, murderous intent was brewing within his heart, and it was on the verge of boiling over.
This was the first time he’d been so thoroughly enraged since arriving in the Netherworld!
But just as Su Yi planned to take the old blind man away, the warm, mellow voice of an elder resounded throughout the vast cave.
“You’re already here, so how could we let you leave?”
To one side of the bronze temple’s entrance, the ripples of a formation appeared in a patch of shadows deep within the enormous mass of interwoven black chains.
Shortly after, an old man in dark robes appeared out of nowhere, carrying a white fly whisk. He looked benevolent and amiable, with the air of a Daoist immortal. However, shortly after he appeared, a terrifying aura permeated the air. This was the distinctive might of a Profound Serenity powerhouse!
“Run, Your Excellency!” The old blind man cried out in alarm.
“Hahaha, I’ve already waited here a long time. How could I possibly let you two leave?”
A static, shadowy figure on one of the steep mountains in another direction suddenly shifted, transforming into a thin man in golden robes.
His hair was white, and he looked like a young man in his twenties. His eyes flashed like cold lightning, and his aura wasn’t the least bit inferior to the old man in dark robes.
There was no doubt about it. He, too, was a Profound Serenity Emperor!
The old blind man’s heart shook.
However, Su Yi’s gaze was just as calm as before. “There’s no need to skulk and hide any longer. All of you, come on out.”
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