Chapter 22: Ancient Tomb, Hidden Golden Seal Script
The qingmu spirit pearl vibrated ceaselessly in Lu Qingyang’s Dantian. He squatted at the rift of the Burial Dragon Abyss, counting the broken crystals in his Storage Pouch, his fingertips moistened with saliva as he repeatedly caressed the gilded hairpin Su Li had pawned: “Su Gu Niang, is the head of this hairpin inlaid with Profound Ice Jade? I once saw one the size of a fingernail in the black market of the Eastern Wasteland…”
“Smack!”
A talisman thrown by Su Li slapped his wrist as he counted money, sending three broken crystals rolling into the deep abyss. Lu Qingyang immediately lunged to the cliff edge to try and retrieve them, completely disregarding the strong winds that cut off half his sleeve: “Three fen of broken Spirit Stone can buy twenty catties of spiritual grain!” He turned to glare at the young woman who was breaking a Restriction, but then saw her collar slightly open as she formed a hand seal, and quickly averted his gaze, whistling.
“Fellow Daoist Lu, if you peek again, the price of this ‘Profound Yin Pill Scripture’ Incomplete Manual will increase.” Su Li pointed her fingers, igniting a talisman fire. The faint blue light reflected the Soul-Chasing Mark on her collarbone, making it appear and disappear. She deliberately weighed the Incomplete Manual in her palm; the words “foundation establishment pill Formula” on the parchment made Lu Qingyang’s Adam’s apple bob—he had personally seen this girl extract this item from the belly of a Three-Headed Flood Dragon last night.
The sound of metal striking stone came from deep within the rift, and both of them simultaneously rushed towards the source. The swift wind array patterns hidden in Lu Qingyang’s boot soles flared with a faint green light, but he deliberately lagged half a step behind, letting Su Li’s flowing cloud sleeves sweep away the cave’s cobwebs. As the young woman bent down to examine the inscription, a Puppet insect flew out of his sleeve and silently burrowed into her hair bun.
“Immortal Master Burial Dragon passed away here…” Su Li’s fingertip traced the indented inscription, then she suddenly turned and slapped the Incomplete Manual onto Lu Qingyang’s nose: “Fellow Daoist, who is at Qi Condensation Great Perfection, it’s time to exert yourself and break this Five Elements Spirit Locking Array, isn’t it?”
Lu Qingyang chuckled and retreated half a step. The Treasure Seeking Rat hidden in his crotch suddenly squeaked frantically. He pretended to take out food for his spirit pet, but actually, using his wide robe to conceal it, he stuffed the array-breaking pestle, which he had taken from the corpse of a Taiyi Pavilion Disciple three days prior, into the rat’s mouth. The moment the grey furball scurried onto the stone beam, the entire cave’s spiritual pulse suddenly inverted.
“The Kan position’s life gate is in the Xun Palace!” Su Li brought out a bronze compass, but saw Lu Qingyang already rolling into a suddenly appearing dark channel, clutching his head. When she gritted her teeth and chased after him, that scoundrel was squatting by a spiritual spring, scooping water to drink, with seven or eight glowing vines wrapped around his waist—he hadn’t forgotten to collect herbs amidst the chaos just now.
At the end of the dark channel hung a bronze coffin, and the Spiritual Qi seeping from the coffin lid’s cracks condensed into rime ice. Lu Qingyang took out half a flatbread and gnawed on it, then kicked a beast head relief at the bottom of the coffin: “The fangs of this taotie pattern are three inches shorter than regulation, it must be a mechanism…” Before he finished speaking, the suction force erupting from inside the coffin pulled half his body into it, and the spirit pearl in his embrace suddenly burst forth with green light.
When Su Li arrived, she only saw an empty coarse hemp outer garment piled on the coffin lid. Lu Qingyang’s muffled shouts came from inside the coffin: “Please hand me a fire starter! This old monster’s burial mattress actually has gold threads mixed in!” She rolled her eyes and threw in a night-luminescent pearl, only to see that fellow sitting cross-legged on a white jade pillow, clutching a Medicine Cauldron with a missing lid and sniffing it vigorously.
“Five-hundred-year-old Dragon Blood Spirit Ganoderma…” Lu Qingyang closed his eyes in intoxication, then suddenly inverted the Medicine Cauldron and shook it wildly. Besides a few moldy pills that clattered to the ground, there was also a Jade Slip wrapped in Shark silk. He wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve, and the moment his fingertip touched the Jade Slip, his spiritual platform suddenly exploded with myriad Sanskrit sounds.
Su Li saw his pupils glow with golden light and quickly chanted the Pure Heart Incantation. Unexpectedly, Lu Qingyang suddenly sprang up, dragging her into a suddenly opened secret passage at the bottom of the coffin. As the two tumbled into the spirit pearl space, the roaring sound from the outside world shook the spiritual plants in the medicine field, making them fall askew.
“What trick are you playing again, Lu!” Su Li broke free from his iron-like arm, only to see him staring at the hourglass illusion, calculating the time. Ten days in the spirit pearl space was but a moment in the outside world; he was actually taking the opportunity to press the Jade Slip to his forehead to comprehend it, while chewing on a burial spirit fruit he had just pilfered.
“The Grand Void Condensing Yuan Art…” The Spiritual Qi around Lu Qingyang fluctuated, expanding and contracting, and the veins on his neck bulged like wriggling earthworms. Su Li was about to suppress his rampaging spiritual power when he suddenly opened his eyes and grinned: “Su Gu Niang, have you heard of Dual Cultivation? My Foundation Establishment Bottleneck…”
“Bang!”
A medicine pestle grazed his ear and embedded itself in the spiritual soil behind him. Su Li crushed a communication Jade Talisman, her face like frost. Lu Qingyang pouted and touched his embrace, his expression suddenly changing—the “Ye” character token had turned into dust at some unknown time, and was now sifting through his fingers.
A sword cry suddenly came from outside, and the voice of Taiyi Pavilion’s Enforcement Elder, Ye Wuchen, penetrated the spatial barrier: “Little Friend Lu, if you are willing to hand over the spirit pearl, you can have thirty percent of what was obtained from the Burial Dragon Abyss.” Lu Qingyang’s eyes lit up upon hearing this, but then he saw Su Li had pressed the Incomplete Manual to her Dantian, clearly intending to detonate her Golden Core and perish together.
“Wait!” He painfully tore off half of the Incomplete Manual and threw it out of the space, taking the opportunity to harvest all the spiritual plants in the entire medicine field. When Ye Wuchen’s Sword Qi split open the bronze coffin, Lu Qingyang was squatting by the dark river, holding a chipped clay bowl, with a withered lotus leaf floating in it.
“This is the Dao Comprehension Teacup used by Immortal Master Burial Dragon!” He shouted to the pursuers with a serious demeanor, “Fellow Daoists, the highest bidder gets it!” While everyone was stunned, he suddenly smashed the clay bowl against the rock wall. In the exploding poisonous mist, dozens of Treasure Seeking Rats, each carrying a Storage Pouch, scattered and fled.
Su Li dragged him into the underground dark river amidst the chaos, only to see this fellow counting his spoils of war while treading water. When the screams of the pursuers gradually became inaudible, Lu Qingyang suddenly let out a muffled groan and sank to the bottom of the water—the hidden injuries from forcibly breaking through to Qi Condensation Great Perfection had finally erupted. When Su Li pulled him up, she found that the incomplete page of the “Profound Yin Pill Scripture” he tightly clutched in his embrace was soaked with blood, revealing a hidden Secret Realm map.
“Greedy and lecherous… but better than a hypocrite.” She looked at his face, which was still muttering about the number of Spirit Stones even in his sleep, and, as if possessed, slipped half a Soul-Locking Jade into his clothes. In the faint light at the end of the dark river, Taiyi Pavilion’s chasing soul banner was vaguely visible, and the spirit pearl in Lu Qingyang’s Dantian was absorbing the yin evil Qi accumulated over a thousand years in the Burial Dragon Abyss.