Archfiend

Chapter 382: The Gold-Banded Staff (7)

What is that thing? Even if Zhao Ziqi’s education was richer, everything before his eyes still astonished him. In the seabed tomb, suspected to be the Bermuda Triangle, such a totally irrelevant object had appeared! 

“This might be the passage from back then.” Xu Yangyi gazed ahead for a couple seconds and murmured, “It might be part of the Clearcloud Realm’s ‘platform’.”

No one spoke. Several seconds passed, and Xu Yangyi took a step forward.

Big bro! Zhao Ziqi was frightened out of his wits. Y-You’re… 

“Wait for me.” Xu Yangyi didn’t explain further and rose into the air. Just as he was about to fly towards the stone platform though, he suddenly felt as if he was burdened with several hundred thousand catties of weight! With a heavy groan, he was forcibly suppressed to the ground!

BOOM! Qi passed under his feet, and spider-web cracks appeared on the ground. He kept down his billowing qi and looked above in surprise.

A Sky Restriction!

There was actually a Sky Restriction here!

Dozens of minutes ago, there hadn’t been anything here! Following this iron staff’s appearance, a Sky Restriction had actually been set!

Swish… At this time, in the fathomless abyss in front of Xu Yangyi and Zhao Ziqi, a several-ten-meter-long tail rose up. In the wake of a vicious slam, a crash boomed and many bones flung up. The bones filled the sky and rained down. Black streaks resembled a surging tide. Afterwards, the bones cascaded down like a waterfall.

Ahead, the profound staff was separated by a several-hundred-meter-wide precipice. Below the precipice was a greater demon. Based on its body, it was late-stage Foundation Establishment at the minimum. Up above was the Sky Restriction. At this moment, Xu Yangyi could neither advance nor retreat.

He didn’t speak. Instead, he cautiously took a few steps back. At his back was a wall of water with countless floating coffins. He flashed forward, activated a technique to avoid water, and then leaped ahead.

There was no restriction whatsoever!

“Looks like the Sky Restriction only applies to the seabed tomb.” His gaze shimmered as he glanced all around, and he said in a low voice, “Let’s go.”

Okay… huh?! Zhao Ziqi answered out of habit, yet then said in shock, Big bro, the passage leading to Earth might be h-here! Y-You don’t want to return to Earth?

“I want to more than anyone else…” Xu Yangyi sighed. Nanzhou… over yonder was the land of his second transformation, the Xingtian Legion, the Hidden Dragon Legion, the Zhao Clan, and his body. All were waiting on him. How could he not want to?

“But that still depends on my current strength.”

“My spiritual sense can’t make it down there. I can’t even see that demon’s body. A demon’s body itself is a third stronger than a cultivator’s. As long as it’s middle-stage Foundation Establishment, I have almost no way of winning a fight against it. And this greater demon seems to be guarding that staff. I don’t even know if there’s anything mystical about the staff. Crossing rashly will only lead to death.”

He shook his head without any reluctance. His present task was go find the figure behind Zu Huai’en. He and his fellow Foundation Establishment could join hands and jointly explore this seabed graveyard.

Legions of coffins encircled the triangle-shaped region into a black iron bucket. Xu Yangyi transformed into a silver arrow, punching through the water and rushing above.

However, just as he was 300 meters out, he came to an abrupt stop.

Big bro? Zhao Ziqi asked him questioningly. Didn’t Xu Yangyi say he wanted to leave? Why had the demon slayer stopped?

Xu Yangyi inhaled deeply and raised his hand, motioning for silence. Moments ago, he’d heard an extremely faint cracking noise groan.

The sound… of a coffin opening!

The black seabed was quiet and deathly still. Ten minutes after his pause, another crack rang out. This time, even Zhao Ziqi heard it.

No one said anything. Xu Yangyi’s gaze was akin to starlight, nailed into the surrounding coffins. After a minute, the sound of cracks filled the ocean mausoleum!

Every single coffin’s lid… had opened!

T-This… Zhao Ziqi was stricken dumb. He dared to vow that there weren’t any qi waves in the vicinity! How could the coffin lids suddenly open? Could it be that living people were coming out from inside?

All around, here and now… a hundred million coffins, the dead of the entire Clearcloud Realm, all opened! Dark-green sculptures slowly floated out from the caskets. Very soon… 

GOD!!! Zhao Ziqi was so startled that he jumped out from Xu Yangyi’s spiritual sense. His misty form looked at the surroundings, in astonishment. W-What the heck is going on?!?!

The seabed was bright.

There were no stars in the Clearcloud Realm, so light couldn’t penetrate the bottom of the ocean. To describe the lack of light as the darkness within a clenched fist was no exaggeration. Nonetheless, pale-white swaths now ignited the seabed into a promenade of corpses!

That… into pale fires!

Each coffin burned with a washbowl-sized flame, following the heels to rub the shoulders in their proximity to each other. It was like… the open eyes of every corpse were floating in the pitch-black seabed. Eyes without any vitality seemed to revive and calmly observe Xu Yangyi.

The black seabed, the pale fires, and a hundred million corpses!

Xu Yangyi’s spiritual force was already coursing through his entire body, but in the next second all the jade sculptures moved.

They did not rush him… instead, they all charged towards the staff in a frenzy!

Swooosh!!! As if a dam had collapsed, a jade sculpture charged out of the seabed and immediately gave rise to a ripple. Now… among the hundred million jade sculptures, there was no distinction! A jade tide was formed! From the four directions and eight reaches, they all rushed into the forbidden triangle-shaped region! And in the next instant… a burst of sharp cracks echoed through the entire space!

“This…” Xu Yangyi stared blankly and then stormed ahead with all his power!

The jade sculptures were crumbling apart! 

The jade sculptures he couldn’t break, in the instant they rushed into the triangular ocean region, as they were several hundred meters away from the staff, all shattered! And underneath the glossy exterior of the jade sculptures… the Yuenü Tribe’s qi, a qi that could be called a universal blood, was revealed!

Flowers of qi floated in midair, simply pausing for a little and then quickly turning into spirit orbs that were followed by several-meter-long tails of light. They rushed straight to the staff!

Huuummm… As each qi orb entered, the staff stirred with faint movements imperceptible to the human eye. There seemed to be raindrops of light orbs all around! As if the vitality of the Yuenü Tribe was going to be used to level open this staff!

“Universal blood…” Xu Yangyi’s gaze was incredibly austere, his speed already pushed to the max! While he didn’t know if this qi could suppport his body and allow his currently-unable-to-cultivate self to keep cultivating, he did know that apart from here, this chance to obtain the qi of the Clearcloud Realm’s once-in-ten-years dead couldn’t be gained anywhere else!

Swoosh! Amidst his realization, he broke through the sea curtain. He’d already rose several hundred meters above the seabed. In the instant he charged, his wings suddenly opened, and he glided high in the air!

Hum! Just as he dashed ahead, an absolute oppressive force quickly descended. The Sky Restriction had arrived. He rapidly plummeted, but a ray of black light fired out. Wreathed in an endless tail of qi, it stormed directly to the stone platform at the middle of the seabed tomb.

This blackness was the Animus Armament. All transformations before him were due to this staff’s rise. He didn’t dare confirm if pure qi could pierce the staff, but so long as it was able to… he could pull it back like a hooking claw.

Clang! A sharp sound echoed. Unexpectedly, the Animus Armament firmly stabbed into the staff. Flecks of stone splashed through the air. To Xu Yangyi’s surprise, the sound of metal rang out.

Still, he no longer had the mind to consider these aspects. He memorized this bit in his heart and forcefully pulled. Like a magnet, the Animus Armament was stabbed into the staff, and he then yelled and swooshed forward from far away, like Tarzan. [1]

There was no time to consider… because as soon as he entered the triangle-shaped tomb, there had always been some qi that couldn’t avoid entering his body. But as the first qi orb rushed out, he discovered… 

That he could store it!!!

The Eternal Alchemy Canon wasn’t incapable of absorbing qi, but rather storing it! All qi first arrived to the qi sea, but he didn’t have a qi sea anymore. In a situation without a fire seed to compact and transform, all qi would spill out of his body in three seconds. He basically couldn’t keep a greater qi cycle that was worth several hours of cultivation. The cycle of absorption into the qi sea, compaction through the fire seed, and transportation to the meridians, was broken.

The Yuenü Tribe’s qi was different, however. Once their qi entered the body, it would steadily enter the Eight Mystic Meridians and the Twelve Proper Meridians. It wouldn’t pass through the transfer of the qi sea! On the contrary, it would go straight into the meridians! The final step attained by the Eternal Alchemy Canon! [2]

Xu Yangyi feared… that this was the only opportunity!

The Yuenü Tribe’s universal blood couldn’t be found elsewhere!

Swoosh… He was like a solitary goose sweeping past the horizon, flying a thousand meters to the the overhanging cliff. He didn’t need more qi. All he needed was 1%, even a thousandth or ten-thousandth! Anything could help his pinnacle enlightenment take one step further!

“ROAR!!!” At the same time, as he flew up to the hanging cliff, he clearly saw… several hundred red lights brighten down below.

“Come on…” he breathed in deeply, and the Ten Cardinals Purgatory thundered! Massive and around fifty to sixty meters in size, the fireball circled around him and incinerated everything down to the square inch!

The greatest obstruction… were these several hundred meters. The difference between heaven’s hall and the earthly realm.

Time seemed to slow here. In the distant Zhao Ziqi’s eyes, he only saw a giant round head, It was like a tadpole, oily-black in color, yet covered in fish scales. On it, there were hundreds of mouths. Each one spat out a ten-odd-meter-long tongue that was dripping with nauseating yellow saliva. Its skull was no less than 300 meters in size. From the abyss, it was like the carp that leapt over the Dragon’s Gate. The monster’s largest mouth tore down at Xu Yangyi with all its strength!

Crash! A sky full of bones flew up with the beast. Like endless streams, black mist rocketed up. In a twinkling, Xu Yangyi’s entire body had vanished from the great maw. All that remained was a faintly discernible qi chain, linked to the staff. It was like the great carp that High Duke Jiang had once hooked upon his fishing rod. [3]

Big bro!!! Zhao Ziqi cried out.

Xu Yangyi wasn’t flustered.

Any treasure was bound to be protected by a demonbeast. This was basically the cultivation world’s ironclad law. Before scheming over the Yuenü Tribe’s several hundred million orbs of qi, he had readied himself to directly confront it!

Swoosh… He seemed to be instantly sucked into the black hole. With precision, the mothership-like demonbeast gobbled him up. Inside the monster’s mouth was not just one row of teeth, but rather countless rings of fangs. With a following clang, the “crack of heaven” formed by the giant beast’s upper and lower jaws vanished.

In the obsidian darkness, sharp teeth overlooked Xu Yangyi’s body!