Chapter 54: Nether Abyss of Corrosive Bones
The emerald light bursting from the qingmu spirit pearl pierced through the perpetual gloomy mist of the Nether Abyss. Lu Qingyang sped along the rock wall, treading on the corrosive bone water seeping out, the runes on his boot soles leaving charred footprints on the moss.
The bronze casket in Su Li's arms trembled incessantly, and the dark red blood threads overflowing from its seams resonated with the spirit pearl, illuminating dense, intricate incantations on the rock wall a hundred zhang ahead—it was precisely the "Bone-Corroding Demon Sealing Formation" recorded in the 'Chronicles of the Eastern Barrens'.
"Fellow Daoist Lu, have you heard of the method of breaking a Formation with blood sacrifice?" Su Li suddenly tugged at his sleeve, the Taiyi Pavilion brand on her collarbone glowing with eerie golden patterns. "This Formation requires the heart blood of a Nascent Soul Cultivator as an lead, otherwise..."
Before she could finish, three spirit-breaking arrows, carrying a fishy wind, attacked. Lu Qingyang spun, pushing Su Li towards a rock crevice. The hourglass within the qingmu spirit pearl inverted, and the arrows decayed into ash the moment they touched his protective spiritual light.
From the shadows came the clatter of chains dragging on the ground, and twelve corpse puppets in tattered armor crawled out of the gloomy river, their hollow eye sockets flickering with ghostly blue soul fire.
"Yin Soldiers Borrowing the Dao!" Su Li's fingertip condensed an ice prism talisman, but the talisman paper spontaneously combusted in mid-air. "These are from the ancient war between immortals and demons..."
The corpse puppets suddenly roared in unison, their sound waves shaking countless stalactites from the rock ceiling. Black blood seeped from Lu Qingyang's left ear, and in a daze, he saw the illusory image of a Formation diagram appear above the medicinal field within the spirit pearl—the bone-corroding grass, watered with Dragon blood, was wildly swaying, its leaf patterns identical to the incantations on the rock wall.
"Step back!" He bit his tongue, spraying out a mist of blood. The roots of the bone-corroding grass pierced through the spirit pearl's space and embedded themselves in reality. The corpse puppets' movements abruptly froze, and dark green vines drilled through the gaps in their armor, grinding the twelve Yin Soldiers into a sky full of bone dust.
Su Li's pupils contracted. The bronze casket clicked open by half an inch, revealing half a finger bone inscribed with ancient seal script.
Lu Qingyang wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth; the wound on his palm, a backlash from the bone-corroding grass, was bone-deep. The medicinal field within the spirit pearl's space had turned to scorched earth, and the hourglass's cracks spread like a spiderweb—the price of forcefully activating an ancient spiritual plant was nearly destroying this treasured item that had accompanied him for many years.
Soul lamps suddenly lit up on the opposite bank of the gloomy river, and someone clapped their hands and chuckled softly: "To be able to activate the bone-corroding grass with Qi Condensation cultivation, no wonder Senior Brother Ye's Soul-Chasing Mark is on you."
A Cultivator in black robes strode over the waves, the seven-petal lotus-patterned jade pendant at his waist reflecting golden light on the water. It was Ye Wuchen, the chief Disciple of the Taiyi Pavilion's Law Enforcement Hall.
Su Li suddenly crushed a communication talisman in her sleeve; the talisman ash condensed into a sword shape and thrust directly at Ye Wuchen's brow: "It's time to settle the score for the Burial Dragon Abyss!"
"Junior Sister Su is still so impetuous." Ye Wuchen flicked his finger, shattering the sword's shadow, but his gaze fell on Lu Qingyang's bleeding palm. "For the qingmu spirit pearl to recognize a master requires Taiyi Pavilion's secret art. Daoist Lu, you forcibly refined it and have not suffered a backlash until now, which reminds Mr. Ye of an old matter—" A yellowed Jade Slip flew out from his sleeve. When unrolled, it revealed a portrait of the Old Drunkard in his youth. "The renegade Disciple who stole the spirit pearl sixty years ago, must have a deep connection with Your Excellency, wouldn't you agree?"
Lu Qingyang's knuckles turned white, and he was oblivious to the fragments of the medicinal shovel cutting into his palm. The spirit pearl suddenly erupted with dazzling clear light, and a tender sprout emerged from the charred medicinal field, its leaf patterns vaguely forming the characters "Burial Dragon."
He abruptly pulled Su Li and leaped into the gloomy river. The remaining roots of the bone-corroding grass wrapped around Ye Wuchen's ankle: "Tell the old fogeys of Taiyi Pavilion that Mr. Lu will come to the Ascension Platform for a drink sooner or later!"
The river water carried the two into an underground dark river. The bronze casket crashed against a reef and completely split open. The moment the finger bone fell into the water, the entire gloomy river boiled as if cooked, and the riverbed cracked open into a chasm ten thousand zhang deep.
In the vortex, Lu Qingyang glimpsed a colossal bronze gate suspended at the bottom of the abyss. The Dragon-shaped bas-reliefs on the gate rings were precisely identical to the newly emerged patterns within the spirit pearl.
"Hold tight!" Su Li suddenly bit her fingertip and drew a blood talisman; the talisman transformed into a transparent Qi shield, enveloping the two. As they fell, Lu Qingyang saw countless afterimages flash outside the Qi shield—armored Cultivators battling three-headed, six-armed demonic creatures, immortal cranes carrying broken swords soaring through a sea of fire, finally freezing on a familiar figure before the giant gate: the Old Drunkard was embedding half a bronze compass into the gate's crevice!
When the Qi shield shattered with a roar, the qingmu spirit pearl automatically flew towards the bronze gate. Lu Qingyang grabbed Su Li's wrist in the torrent, only to see the Taiyi Pavilion brand on her collarbone crumble inch by inch, revealing a hidden Phoenix-shaped birthmark underneath.
The moment the spirit pearl touched the giant gate, Lu Qingyang's Divine Sense was struck by lightning, and a vast sea of memories flooded his mind—
Sixty years ago, on the battlefield of immortals and demons, the Taiyi Pavilion Elders used the essence blood of a hundred thousand Cultivators to water the remnants of the Jianmu (Divine Tree), attempting to reopen the path to Ascension. When the Old Drunkard stole the spirit pearl, he was also holding an infant girl in his arms...
"So you are the key!" Ye Wuchen's cold laugh came from above. In his hand, he held half a bronze gate ring, and twelve blood-colored Flying Swords hovered behind him. "Junior Sister Su Li, you played the part of 'Saintess of Burial Dragon Abyss' quite diligently."
Lu Qingyang suddenly felt a lightness in his arms as Su Li transformed into a stream of light and vanished into the bronze gate's crevice. The giant gate trembled, opening a crack, and the Chaos Qi gushing from within corroded his right arm, leaving the bone exposed.
Before he completely lost consciousness, he saw the newborn sprout within the spirit pearl grow wildly, instantly transforming into the illusory image of the Jianmu, connecting heaven and earth.