The blizzard on the Northern Dipper coast roared like a ferocious beast, sweeping in. Wherever it passed, even star marrow fragments were caught within it, dancing in the sky.
In this world of ice and snow, Lu Qingyang leaned against the wreckage of the Ferrying Calamity Boat, his figure appearing somewhat lonely and desolate. His fingertips gently caressed the cracks on the Yin Yang Jade Pendant, as if he could feel the pendant's former warmth and smoothness.
However, just as he was lost in thought, a faint frost pattern suddenly appeared on the surface of the jade pendant. These frost patterns, as if alive, began to twist and squirm, eventually reflecting a scene — Leng Yuehan wielding her sword in the Tianshuang Pavilion Forbidden Land.
In the image, Leng Yuehan's swordplay was like a sudden storm. The long sword in her hand drew streaks of cold light in the air, each strike landing on an ice peak, scattering countless ice fragments. What was surprising was that these ice fragments were mixed with fragments of the Starry Sky Merchant Guild's profound iron tokens!
"Lu Senior!" A shout interrupted Lu Qingyang's thoughts. He looked up to see a Northern Dipper youth rushing towards him, holding a cracked star pattern chain.
The youth ran to Lu Qingyang, panting, and said, "Third Uncle said this chain is resonating, I'm afraid..."
"I'm afraid the Soul Devouring Sect is digging up the Northern Dipper family's ancestral graves?" Lu Qingyang suddenly sneered, interrupting the youth. His gaze fell on the chain in the youth's hand, and he saw the star patterns on the chain's surface flickering with a faint light, seemingly echoing some kind of power.
A cold smile appeared on Lu Qingyang's lips. The copper coin sword in his hand suddenly lifted the youth's collar, revealing the Northern Dipper curse mark on the corpse of the youth's Sixth Elder. The curse mark showed a strange dark red color, clearly having been recently applied.
"The Northern Dipper curse mark on your Sixth Elder's corpse is much fresher than this chain." Lu Qingyang's voice revealed a hint of disdain. His sword tip trembled slightly, and the rust on the chain's surface began to peel off, revealing dark red ice crystals underneath.
These ice crystals rapidly condensed in the air, forming a small star map. Within the star map, the lingering shadows of Guanghan Palace's unique sword art flickered, as if narrating a forgotten past.
Lin Pangzi, like a mountain, laboriously squeezed out of the ice cave carrying a Pill Furnace. The purple fire within the furnace flickered erratically like a candle in the wind: "You Last name Lu! I refined it with Sanwei True Fire for three whole hours, and inside the fragments of that bronze coffin..." His words suddenly stopped as if his throat had been choked. The moment the furnace lid was opened, half of a frozen fox tail shot out like lightning with the firelight. The golden bell at the tip of the tail emitted crisp and chaotic sounds, as if telling something.
Lu Qingyang's pupils suddenly contracted, like two stars instantly dimming, while the Chaos Green Lotus bloomed fiercely in his Dantian like a blossoming lotus. The moment the lotus petals swept across the fox tail, Su Meiniang's delicate, blood-tinged groan seemed to Transmigrate through the Void Realm, piercing everyone's eardrums like a sharp thorn: "Little Lord, how cruel you are! The rebirth monument of Qingqiu has been dug up, why don't you come quickly..." The sound suddenly stopped, like a string being cut, and the fox tail exploded like a star, shattering into countless ice crystals. Each ice crystal was like a mirror, clearly reflecting the scene of the Starry Sky Merchant Guild's Steward crushing the Qingqiu fox head.
"Brother Lu!" The Northern Dipper Old Man stumbled over, leaning on his star staff like a candle in the wind. The fragment of the Heaven-Gazing Mirror embedded in the staff's head seemed to be dripping blood, exuding heart-stopping bloody tears, "The array core of the Yin and Yang spring eye is moving, the Starry Sky Merchant Guild is going to use a living sacrifice..." Before he could finish speaking, the coastline suddenly rose up a hundred-zhang-high ice wall, like a waking giant beast. A huge bronze hand stretched out from the cracks in the ice, like a devil's hand from Hell, holding the Soul Suppressing Cauldron that Leng Yuehan had painstakingly searched for.
The star pattern chains entwined around the cauldron suddenly seemed to come alive, attacking everyone like venomous snakes. The clashing sound of the chain links was like the roar of a ghost, mixed with the eerie sounds from the Soul Devouring Sect's Soul Summoning Banner.
"Lin Pangzi, forge a sword with the Pill Fire!" Lu Qingyang, like lightning, threw out his copper coin sword. After being enveloped by the purple fire, the sword instantly grew ten zhang, like a fire Dragon. "Northern Dipper kid, use the star map to lock the cauldron's ears!"
"Do you think I'm an Artifact Refining furnace?" Lin Pangzi cursed and formed a hand Seal, but the Pill Furnace had already spewed out its vital essence fire. In the torrent of molten red gold formed by the copper coin sword, the phantom of Su Meiniang's nine tails fighting a traitor of Qingqiu emerged. The moment the sword's edge touched the Soul Suppressing Cauldron, the Primordial Xuanhuang Qi gushing from the cauldron suddenly turned, sweeping the pursuing Starry Sky Cultivator into a spatial rift.
Leng Yuehan's Ice Soul Sword Qi suddenly pierced through the clouds, and the Taiyin Soul Slaughtering Wheel crushed half of the ice wall. She leaped onto Lu Qingyang's side, her newly replaced ice soul hairpin already stained with black blood: "Inside the bronze coffin in Guanghan Palace's Forbidden Land, the corpse of the Starry Sky Merchant Guild's first generation Steward is sealed."
"What a coincidence." Lu Qingyang tore open his collar, revealing the Northern Dipper curse mark spreading across his chest, "I also keep a coffin in my Nascent Soul Dao platform." The Chaos Green Lotus responded by leaving his body. On the surface of the miniature coffin suspended in the lotus's heart, the star patterns perfectly matched the corpse Leng Yuehan had brought.
The Northern Dipper Old Man suddenly spat out a large mouthful of black blood, and his star staff pointed towards the depths of the blizzard: "They're here!"
The sea surface suddenly boiled, and seventy-two Starry Sky Spirit Boats broke through the waves. On the deck of the central colossal ship, the Grand Elder of Guanghan Palace, who had "fallen" three hundred years ago, was gently stroking an ice coffin. Inside the coffin lay Su Meiniang's true fox body. The Starry Sky brand behind her ear oozed black blood, and the blood beads falling into the sea solidified into ice spikes, pinning the Northern Dipper Dragon Puppets attempting to approach onto the reefs.
"What a grand deception." Lu Qingyang suddenly clapped his hands and laughed loudly, his laughter shattering the incoming ice spikes. "Using Guanghan Palace's Taiyin Profound Qi to nurture the coffin, and taking the Qingqiu fox body as the array core, the Soul Devouring Sect certainly knows how to pick up ready-made bargains."
The copper coin sword suddenly turned its blade and pierced into his Dantian. The Chaos Green Lotus, wrapped around his Nascent Soul, broke out of his body. Wherever the lotus petals swept, the Starry Sky Spirit Boats' protective arrays tore like thin paper. Leng Yuehan's Taiyin Soul Slaughtering Wheel followed closely, and in the gap cut by its blade, countless Ice Soul Sword Qi condensed into the phantoms of Guanghan Palace's successive Ancestral Masters.
"Lu Qingyang!" The Starry Sky Steward's roar shattered three Spirit Boats. "How dare you destroy my three-hundred-year plan..."
"Mr. Lu dares to collect interest even more!" The green lotus roots suddenly plunged into the colossal ship's keel. In the Primordial Xuanhuang Qi gushing from the coffin in the lotus's heart, the lingering phantom of the Soul Devouring Sect Master and the Guanghan Grand Elder's secret conversation emerged. In the image, deep within the Yin and Yang spring eye entwined with star pattern chains, a sleeping bronze giant coffin was awakening.
Lin Pangzi suddenly threw out a remnant page of a medical classic. Words condensed from Pill Fire burned in the air: "Brother Lu! What's in that coffin is..."
"It's the corpse I severed three hundred years ago!" Lu Qingyang's Nascent Soul suddenly opened its eyes, and a green lotus bloomed fiercely in its pupils. The moment the lotus petals swept across the Starry Sky Steward, the star pattern on his glabella suddenly exploded, and the black blood that gushed out was of the same origin as the bloodstains on Leng Yuehan's ice soul hairpin.
The giant coffin's lid crashed open. In the surging torrent of star marrow, twelve Jiaozi statues floated in the air, supporting the bronze coffin. The corpse in the coffin slowly sat up, its face bearing a seventy percent resemblance to Lu Qingyang, except for a Starry Sky brand on its glabella. As the corpse raised its hand, the Northern Dipper youth's star pattern chain suddenly backfired, crushing the Northern Dipper Old Man into a bloody mist.
"So that's how it is..." Leng Yuehan suddenly ran her fingers across her ice soul hairpin, and an extremely cold Sword Qi pierced into her heart. In the gushing ice crystals, a scene from the Tianshuang Pavilion Forbidden Land appeared — her true body was still holding a sword to suppress the coffin deep within the snowy mountains. The one present here was actually an Ice Soul Clone.
Lu Qingyang's Nascent Soul suddenly swelled, and the Chaos Green Lotus roots entwined around the giant coffin: "Lin Pangzi, do you remember when I said I was going to tear off the fig leaf?"
"You didn't say you were tearing off your own coffin!" Lin Pangzi painfully crushed his vital Pill Furnace, and the purple fire within the furnace condensed into a fire Dragon that coiled around the corpse.
"Northern Dipper kid, catch this!" Lu Qingyang suddenly pulled out the bronze coffin from his Nascent Soul Dao platform and threw it at the Northern Dipper youth. The moment the youth caught the coffin, the star pattern chains within it suddenly drilled into his seven orifices, transforming him into a Starry Sky Puppet that lunged at Leng Yuehan.
Su Meiniang's fox tail phantom suddenly emerged from the Void Realm, and the golden bell at the tip of her tail shattered the Puppet's celestial spirit: "Little Lord's debts must be repaid!" Amidst the ringing, the rebirth monument of Qingqiu's ancestral land collapsed, and the three thousand Fox Fire sealed within it all surged into Lu Qingyang's body.
The Chaos Green Lotus transformed into a reddish-gold color in the Fox Fire, and the coffin in its heart devoured the Starry Sky corpse completely. Lu Qingyang's true body suddenly opened its eyes, and star patterns intertwined with the green lotus in his pupils: "Everyone, it's time to settle accounts."
The copper coin sword, carrying the Fox Fire, pierced into the Yin and Yang spring eye. In the surging tsunami of star marrow, all seventy-two Spirit Boats were reduced to bronze fragments. The moment the blizzard ceased, a giant Northern Dipper star map appeared beneath their feet, with each main star entwined with broken star pattern chains.
Leng Yuehan's Ice Soul Clone suddenly melted, and her true body from the depths of the snowy mountains broke through the barrier with her sword; Su Meiniang, with her nine tails wrapped around the Starry Sky Steward's remnant soul, rode the waves; Lin Pangzi held his newly refined Pill Furnace, and the purple fire within the furnace condensed into the life soul phantom of Lu Qingyang.
"It's not over yet." Lu Qingyang suddenly crushed the Yin Yang Jade Pendant, and the fragments condensed into the Ferrying Calamity Boat, which slammed into a certain spot in the Void Realm. The moment the boat's body shattered, the true controller of the bronze giant coffin — half of the Soul Devouring Sect Master's face — appeared in the star map, and was quickly torn apart by the green lotus roots.
The Northern Dipper youth suddenly knelt down as if struck by lightning, vomiting star marrow that shone as brightly as dazzling stars. Above the core of the Puppet in his hand, Lu Qingyang's fate imprint flickered: "Lu Senior, I..." "Your Third Uncle's Heaven-Gazing Mirror had long seen through that you were a Starry Sky mole."
Lu Qingyang flicked his finger with the force of thunder, shattering the youth's Dantian. The Tiantian Daowen, like a hungry tiger pouncing on its prey, completely devoured his Nascent Soul. "The corpse of the Northern Dipper family's Sixth Elder, wasn't it you who personally sent it into that bottomless abyss of the Gui Xu?"
The wind and snow suddenly stopped, and thousands of bronze coffin fragments floated up from beneath the sea like a sleeping giant beast. Lu Qingyang stood on the largest coffin lid fragment, like a god of war descending. His gaze was like a torch, looking at the blood-red moon in the sky: "Fairy Leng, Su Jiejie, the interest on this Yin and Yang spring..." "Is enough to buy your three humble lives!" The voices of the two women were like orioles emerging from a valley, clear and pleasant. Their Sword Qi and Fox Fire intertwined into an impenetrable net, tightly binding the last fleeing Starry Sky Cultivator, eventually refining them into ashes.
The wreckage of the Ferrying Calamity Boat suddenly trembled violently, as if groaning in pain. The bronze fragments adsorbed to the bottom of the boat, like a disturbed swarm of bees, seeped out star marrow like countless stars. Lu Qingyang gently caressed the newly born green lotus bud, a devilish smile appearing on his lips, and whispered: "It's time to greet those old friends of the Soul Devouring Sect..."