txolops Chapter 721 Bloodbath! Ice Soul!
Chapter 721 Bloodbath! Ice Soul!
The other person was a female cultivator dressed in a plain white dress, with a cold expression and a pale complexion that was almost transparent. Her silver hair was tied back with a simple wooden hairpin.
She sat with her eyes closed on a piece of broken stone, her aura icy and bone-chilling, covering the area within three feet of her with white frost. Although she was also at the Great Perfection of the Nascent Soul stage, her icy power carried a strange deathly aura, completely different from that of ordinary ice-type cultivators.
As Chen Fan approached, the bald, burly man opened his eyes first. He looked Chen Fan up and down, grinned, revealing a set of gleaming white teeth: "Fire Source, is this the sword cultivator you mentioned who can sense spatial rifts? Late Nascent Soul stage? Doesn't look that impressive."
The female cultivator in white also opened her eyes, her gaze lingering on Chen Fan for a moment before closing them again, seemingly showing no interest in him whatsoever.
Huoyuan Daoist strode out of the stone building, followed by Qingmu and Shiyan. He was wearing a clean robe today, and his smile was even warmer than it had been a month ago: "Fellow Daoist Guimu is indeed punctual. Come, come, let me introduce you."
He pointed at the bald, burly man and said, "This is Fellow Daoist Tu, whose Daoist name is Xue Tu. He was originally a rogue cultivator who was dragged into this place five hundred years ago. Fellow Daoist Xue Tu specializes in physical cultivation, and his Blood Fiend Battle Body is so powerful that even a cultivator at the peak of the Nascent Soul stage would not dare to confront him head-on."
He then pointed to the female cultivator in white and said, "This is Fellow Daoist Bingpo, who was also swept into this place by the spatial turbulence. Fellow Daoist Bingpo cultivates the Dao of Ice Fiend, and her ice-type supernatural abilities are unpredictable, especially in sealing spatial rifts."
Chen Fan bowed to the two men and said, "Gui Muzi, a rogue cultivator from a second-level cultivation country."
Blood Butcher grinned, as a return gesture.
Bingpo merely nodded slightly, without even opening his eyes.
Huoyuan Daoist clapped his hands and said, "Now that everyone is here, let's discuss the specific route. I have been familiar with the outer areas of this region for the past three thousand years, so you can all rest assured. However, I have only explored the edge of the area from the Shattered Stone Plain. If we go any further in, we will need Fellow Daoist Guimu to lead the way."
He took out a jade slip and placed it on the ground. He activated it with his spiritual power, and a simple map was projected in front of everyone.
The map marked the route from the Stone Tower to the Shattered Stone Plain, and then from the Shattered Stone Plain into the deep forbidden zone, with several dangerous places marked with crimson divine consciousness imprints.
"From here to the edge of the Shattered Stone Plains, I will avoid the spatial rifts and mad cultivators along the way. You only need to follow behind me. After reaching the edge of the forbidden zone, the density of spatial rifts will increase sharply. At that time, please ask Fellow Daoist Guimu to lead the way. You all follow closely behind and do not deviate from the route."
He paused, his gaze sweeping across everyone's faces, his tone becoming more serious: "There's another rule after entering the forbidden zone: do not touch those spatial fragments. The depths of the forbidden zone are the territory of half-step Void Refinement old monsters, whose perception of spatial fluctuations far surpasses ours. Once someone touches a spatial fragment, it's highly likely to alert them. At that point, forget about finding an exit; whether you can even retreat alive will be uncertain."
Blood Butcher stroked his bald head and scoffed dismissively, "So what if we're half-step Void Refinement cultivators? With six Nascent Soul cultivators joining forces, are we afraid of them?"
Huoyuan Daoist shook his head, his tone still polite but his attitude quite resolute: "Fellow Daoist Tu is unaware of the situation. Those old monsters who are half-step into the Void Refinement stage have been trapped here for countless years, their minds have long been twisted, and their methods are unfathomable. I once witnessed one of them make a move from afar, shattering a Nascent Soul Grand Perfection cultivator along with the surrounding space within a hundred feet with a single strike. Our purpose here is to find an exit, not to confront those old monsters head-on. Avoid them if you can, remember that."
Although Blood Butcher was not convinced, he did not argue further.
Ice Soul remained silent with its eyes closed.
Aoki and Ishii didn't say a word from beginning to end, but stood silently beside Huoyuan Daoist like two statues.
Chen Fan listened quietly to the side, his face expressionless, but he was secretly making plans in his heart.
Although Huoyuan Daoist's words were addressed to Xue Tu, the information they revealed was quite crucial.
This person had witnessed a half-step Void Refinement old monster make a move at close range and had even managed to retreat alive. This kind of experience is something that ordinary Nascent Soul cultivators at the Great Perfection stage could not possess.
"In that case, let's set off." Daoist Huoyuan put the jade slip back into his sleeve and took the lead in heading northwest.
The six people filed in single file, with Huoyuan Daoren leading the way, followed closely by Qingmu and Shiyan, with Chen Fan in the middle and Xue Tu and Bingpo bringing up the rear.
Along the way, Huoyuan Daoist was indeed extremely familiar with the route. He could avoid a spatial rift every few steps in advance, and he would also detour in time when he encountered the aura of a mad cultivator.
Along the way, he even managed to distract himself by introducing the origins of several ruins to the crowd, although most of it was just speculation. His composure was truly admirable.
After walking for about two hours, the group passed through the corridor area and the edge of the gravel plain that Chen Fan had previously explored, and successfully arrived at the flying boat graveyard.
Seeing these flying ship wrecks up close is even more breathtaking than viewing them from a distance. Thousands of flying ships are scattered haphazardly across the plain, each one tens or even hundreds of feet long.
There were colossal, dark blue metal warships, their hulls engraved with star patterns, and half of their broken rams still remaining at the bow. There were also completely transparent crystal airships, their hulls flowing and graceful like frozen waves; even though most of them were broken, their former splendor was still evident.
There is also a bizarre giant ship built of bones, with blood-red runes on each bone gleaming faintly in the dark underground space.
Blood Butcher walked to the wreckage of a crystal airship, reached out and tapped the hull, producing a clear buzzing sound.
He grinned and said, "If we could take this out, it could probably sell for a lot of spirit stones."
Ice Soul rarely spoke, but his voice was as cold and clear as ice beads falling onto a jade plate: "This flying boat is made of celestial crystal, which has been extinct in the Cultivation Alliance for tens of thousands of years. If you can carry it out, the entire alliance will come looking for you."
Blood Butcher awkwardly withdrew his hand and didn't bring it up again.
After walking through the Flying Boat Graveyard for about the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, the scene ahead suddenly changed.
The spatial rifts, which had been sparse and scattered before, suddenly became dense like a net, each several meters wide, intersecting and overlapping each other, cutting the area in front of them into pieces.
The eerie green demonic energy on the dome was even more concentrated here, almost condensing into a liquid state, and making a low hissing sound as it flowed slowly through the air.
The oppressive atmosphere in the air suddenly intensified, as if an invisible mountain was pressing down on everyone's hearts.
Between the gaps in those spatial rifts, one could vaguely see a vast architectural ruin deeper inside.
The scale of those ruins far exceeded any of the surrounding relics, with the remaining stone pillars reaching hundreds of feet in height, their surfaces densely covered with slowly flowing star map patterns.
Several half-collapsed stone halls stood crookedly amidst the ruins, their circular patterns emitting a ghostly blue light, just like the stone halls on both sides of the riverbed, but on a scale more than ten times larger.