“Good!” Chu Zhaonan’s eyes flashed. “I knew you would say that!”

In kind, Lord Zhao was without objection. 

Most importantly, though, regardless of what it was, they had no fear of thirty Qi Condensation cultivators. Faces heavy like water, Chu Zhaonan and Lord Zhao turned their heads back and waved to the soldiers at the rear. In silence, a dazzlingly variety of magik artifacts flew out. Everyone was already quietly prepared for battle.

“Go!” Xu Yangyi growled, qi revolving around his entire body. He was running at the very lead.

The passage was long, no less than several hundred meters. After everyone turned a corner, Xu Yangyi brought his hand up. With their hands formed in seals, everyone advanced with the gentlest of footsteps.

Ahead was a cavern. It was large, roughly a thousand meters in size. From the top of the cave ceiling to the ground, everything was drawn with runes. Pure-blue, the utmost blue, each talisman was a meter in size, turning the inside of the cave into a dream realm with bold strokes and clear lines.

The cave wasn’t limited to just one entrance; there were another two. All runes converged at the center of the cave, taking the shape of a strange and boundless design. Under the blue fluorescence, countless solidified milky-white motes of qi fluttered all around. Like fireflies in a blue moonlit night, they set off the several hundred meters of jade-green water at the center of the cave. There, qi density seemed to reach the pinnacle. In a breath, a man could sense one’s blood vessels cheering and jumping. 

Apart from this, there was nothing else.

A faint crease formed between Xu Yangyi’s brows. Upon arriving to the cave… that enormous mass of qi had disappeared from his spiritual sense. He dared to confirm, however, that it was here!

“Who on earth created this world here…” Astonished, Zhao Fenglai peered at a mote of qi in his hand, and gently squeezed it. A vast amount of qi wafted up from his fingertips, and his brows smoothed. He moaned as if he taking a drug. “The qi here… surprisingly appears to be driven by these talismans, and it’s actually much stronger than what’s coming from the ground…”

“If you cultivated here for a year, I’m afraid  that it would be the same as five or six years outside…” A cultivator excitedly caught a mote of light, his face flushed red. “If we set down a foundation here, we’d make a killing!”

“My god…” In shock, Mo Yeyu took in everything around him, and rocked his head. “These talismans… I don’t recognize a single one… They definitely aren’t Qi Condensation. Only a grand master would be capable of a drawing technique like this. It’s just like an artificially formed Dragon Vein. But… people are always looking for grand masters, in the cultivation world. How could someone stay here for years and draw such a huge array… no… hold on! Look, guys!”

Without warning, his voice became high-pitched. Several people ahead looked over, but didn’t discover anything. Xu Yangyi locked his eyes towards the direction that Mo Yeyu was pointing at for several seconds, and drew a sharp breath.

Nothing weird could be made out from the lake, but its edges were extremely strange!

It was slick and smooth! Neat and tidy! Simply unlike an underground lake, but as if something had made a hole and then poured water in! The lake’s fringes curved up and down in height. Xu Yangyi studied it for three seconds, and his eyes flashed. He grabbed Mo Yeyu, and the wings of the Ketu-Rahu Sword activated. With a prompt move, he flew to the highest peak in the cave.

The duo ascended higher and higher. Ultimately, the entire lake’s shape presented itself to their eyes. A shiver made its way down Mo Yeyu’s body, and he looked at the lake’s surface in disbelief. The puppeteer then looked above him, cold sweat dotting his brows.

“This… is a palm print…” A fierce knot formed in Mo Yeyu’s throat, and he swallowed hard. Icy perspiration left him dripping-wet. “T-This isn’t an underground lake! This is a palm someone made from the sky! I understand! I get it! Some supreme cultivator… made this formation under Longsu Province, from the sky!”

He wiped away at his icy sweat. “This huge formation is just like a picture. I’m not sure which old monster it was, but they forcibly stamped this picture underground! I’ve read about a technique like this in the Mo Clan’s ancient records, known as ‘Covering Flower, Burying Fog’. It can completely eliminate any left-behind traces of a formation. Even a Dao Master would find it hard to discover this!”

From where they were, they could see a complete view of the lake. It was no natural lake… but rather a palm print that was hundreds of meters wide! At this moment, jade waves rippled, like a jade-green palm!

Everyone was silent, their gazes in contemplation. They seemed to see a supreme cultivator slam down with a palm, all of Longsu Province a domain of smoke and dust! The ground was forcefully sunken in! Vast tracts of earth surged up, burying this formation!

What might!

What style!

This was a true shifting of mountains and filling of seas!

Xu Yangyi eyed his surroundings, and wordlessly shared a glance with Qin Xueluan. Everyone else was in a state of shock and awe, but after he’d flown into the air he had discovered something else.

The black serpent’s corpse… had disappeared! The ground was clean and spotless, without a sliver’s mark of struggle. Still, the serpent wasn’t present! At this time, two swishing noises rang out, and two screens of blue light flared to life out of nowhere, obstructing the other two entrances!

A spark arced through Xu Yangyi’s eyes. Without almost any consideration, he turned and sped towards the path they had originally come from. Nevertheless, an identical light screen blocked their escape route in the next second!

This change had come too abruptly! They had actually been closed in here!

Swish swish swish!

 The present cultivators were soldiers who had survived a bloody battle. Bereft of any wasted words, tens of protective artifacts glimmered and flashed, steadfastly protecting their surroundings!

But at nearly the same, an amazing scene came into view before them!

Crash… 

There was no wind in the cave, but at this moment the entire face of the lake surged with ripples.

Crash… Crash… 

One wave was followed with another, and the tides became greater and greater! Less than ten seconds later, a sonorous rumble followed, and the entire lake morphed into a jade-green pillar of water, rising over ten meters in the air!

No… No longer could this be called water… In this moment, the lake was a roaring sea! From time to time, enormous waves, tens of meters high, rose up! The waters were tranquil like a mirror, on occasion, but these waves even transformed into all kinds of shapes! There were wolves, tigers, a thousand marvelous varieties of feral beasts… there were even humans!

Under the illumination of blue light, sprays of jade-green water reflected a bewitching blue, dyeing the cave both blue and green. The clashing tides seemed to be a seething fountain of blue and green! It was like a living creature! As if it was in the midst of squirming!

Everyone understood what this screen-being was, all of them dazed. They looked at the screen before them, in disbelief.

This… was demonization! Enlightenment!

Had Nanzhou not received the qi reparation, the great lake in this subterranean cave wouldn’t have such an opportunity! Now… after qi had amassed to an extreme point, and knowledge having been slowly taken, the lake’s wisdom had awakened! Henceforth, it would remain unexhausted for all eternity, because it had already broken away from the body of a natural organism. Like them, it had become a supernatural life form!

Moreover… this was a natural cultivation! Not like them at all, who had acquired cultivation instead!

Now was this lake’s most critical moment!

“So that’s how it was…” Qin Xueluan dumbly watched the surging lake, the lakewater torrenting at least ten meters high into the air! In the jade-green lakewater, a man or possibly woman’s face formed. It was both joyous and in pain, but wore deep hostility. It seemed that as long as they approached, they would suffer an all-out attack.

“So this was the case… No wonder, no wonder it had such huge qi fluctuations. The giant mass of qi I sensed earlier wasn’t anything else or something in the lake. It was the lake itself!” Xu Yangyi took a deep breath. A furious blaze was already raging in his left hand.

BOOM!!!

 All the lakewater solidified in midair, but what formed was an immense palm. At the center of this palm, a seam slowly split open, and an endless amount of heavy qi drifted out. Immediately, dozens of meter-sized eyes gently opened.

Crash… 

Like the fall of a rainstorm, countless streams flowed out from the palm of lakewater. The cave was a stretch silence. After ages, a bleak voice rang out little by little. It was hard to understand, yet it carried a wisp of unspeakable joy. At the same time, there was also deep doubt and struggle.

“Who… are you…”

“And who… am I…”

Xu Yangyi didn’t answer straightaway. The scene before his eyes was too strange. Lakewater had transformed into a demon; this went beyond all records, but was in accordance with the principle that “all living things could cultivate”. At some unknown time, Mo Yeyu had walked over besides him and bumped into his shoulder.

“Commander… look at its pupils!”

Mo Yeyu’s voice contained profound disbelief. Xu Yangyi glanced over, but discovered that in the enormous eyes of this hundred-meter-wide demon form that the lakewater had solidified… its pupils were actually radiating extremely pure qi! No… those weren’t pupils!

It was a pure and sparkling gem-like object. Throughout its entire form, there wasn’t a shred of impurity. Bright and lively, even the best gems of the mortal world seemed clumsy and awkward in front of these objects.

“Those…” He took a deep breath. “Are spirit stones?”

“No… it’s not like I haven’t seen high-grade spirit stones… but even high-grade spirit stones don’t reach such a level of pureness. It’s like you can catch a glimpse of an innocent’s soul. This is…” His gaze smoldered, and three voices rang out in chorus as he opened his mouth.

“A supreme-grade spirit stone?!”

While Xu Yangyi’s own voice could still be considered calm, the eyes of Chu Zhaonan and Lord Zhao were already reddened!

“Supreme grade… This is a supreme-grade spirit stone?” Lord Zhao’s hand trembled as he looked at the eye of the giant lakewater demon. “Supreme grade… The country has records of this! The number of pieces in existence doesn’t exceed a hundred! They have detailed files that are even more thorough than on Foundation Establishment Seniors! They’re only used in formations and artifacts that involve China’s greatest secrets! They’re used in China’s Immortal Execution Array that defends China’s sky! They wouldn’t be allowed to be spread outside, unless… unless…”

An idea that brought dread surfaced in his mind. This supreme-grade spirit stone nearly spoke of who had set down this formation!

“Unless… it was a Dao Master…” Chu Zhaonan looked at the supreme-grade spirit stone, bestirred with deep emotion. “Even my grandfather has never seen anything like this, only videos of it. It’s… almost equal to a legend of China… and now I’ve actually gone and seen the real thing…”

“That’s not the only thing!” In the end, Mo Yeyu was unable to contain himself, and he clenched his teeth. “This supreme-grade spirit stone isn’t so simple!”

“It’s the central focus! The central focus!” His gaze was fiery. “The Dao of Puppetry is a side branch belonging to talismans and artificing. We’re very familiar about these kinds of things! Any puppet has to have a central focus! I don’t know which ancestor threw a supreme-grade spirit stone into this lake, but they wanted to get a puppet out of it! This spirit stone is its central focus!”

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