Chapter 168: Sacrifice
Chapter 168: Sacrifice
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On another part of the mountain, a group of black cloaked men had just reached a stone pillar covered in engraved runes.
The moment they laid eyes on it, they instantly understood what it was.
Without hesitation, one of them dashed forward, unleashing his full power at the peak of the fourth stage and striking the stone pillar head on.
The pillar trembled faintly, yet even after the attack, it showed no visible damage, not even a scrach.
This surprised the man, who for a moment doubted his own strength. But just then, another figure stepped out from behind him.
"Tch, I told you. Instead of wasting your time in brothels and gambling dens, you should be focusing on breaking into the fifth stage.
Move aside and let me show you how it’s done," said another cloaked man, his frame slimmer yet overall well built.
Unlike his companion, he had already stepped into the fifth stage. Though he too realized the pillar was no simple thing, something to be expected, since it was one of the three seals of the formation sealing the palace gate, he still didn’t believe that even with his power at the fifth stage, it would remain unscathed.
He drew a thin sword from his spatial ring.
Its blade was pitch black, smooth and metallic, radiating the feeling that it could slice through anything.
He infused it with his spiritual Qi before lunging at the pillar with a sudden burst of speed.
DING!
A harsh metallic sound rang out as the blade collided with the stone. The man, who had thought he could cut through it with ease, felt his entire arm go numb from the impact and the sword’s violent vibration, he had failed to so much as scratch the pillar.
The man who had been arrogant mere seconds ago now wore a solemn expression as he stared at the spot he had struck.
A tiny scratch. Yes, just a tiny, pitiful scratch.
That was all he managed to do to the pillar, even after unleashing one of his most powerful attacks.
"What the hell is this thing ma-" he began to complain, but at that very moment someone shoved him aside.
As he regained his balance and prepared to yell at whoever had pushed him, the words froze in his throat when he saw the figure of their leader standing before him.
No matter how cocky he acted, he didn’t dare utter a word before the leader.
He still valued his life, and if that meant taking a few kicks to the balls from the leader as punishment, he’d gladly take them.
The leader, on the other hand, didn’t care about his subordinate’s dissatisfaction. With calm, fluid movements, he summoned his greatsword from the spatial ring on his finger and took his stance.
His hood had been lowered, fully revealing the face beneath.
He had long hair tied in a bun, a face shaded by a short beard that didn’t hide his sharp features, and black eyes with a faint reddish glint lurking within.
He was Yun Hao, the first born of the current patriarch of the Yun family.
After failing his last mission, he had been sent here under the patriarch’s orders to retrieve the inheritance hidden in the secret realm.
They had already confirmed its existence through certain methods, and even more so when he himself had seen the realm’s guardian spirit, he knew then he was in the right place.
The others might not have noticed anything strange about the spirit, but he did. That didn’t change his plans, though; helping the spirit would only make his mission easier. So he had wasted no time and gone after the seals.
He had an idea of what kind of being lurked behind the spirit, which was why he also knew how powerful these seals might be.
For that reason, he didn’t hold back at all.
He fully released his cultivation base at the peak of the fifth stage, channeled his Qi into the black blade of his greatsword, and with a decisive movement, slashed at the pillar.
His sword was forged from materials of the highest grade, and its rank was far from low. Combined with his cultivation, it was more than enough to unleash a devastating strike, and so it was.
The moment the sword met the pillar, a thin protective layer appears on its surface, resisting the blow and stopping it for an instant.
But it didn’t last long.
The protective layer shattered, and in the next second, the blade pierced straight through the pillar, completing its arc.
The force of the attack was so great that even though the pillar was the target, everything within a hundred meter radius around it was cleanly sliced apart.
As soon as it happened, the stone pillar fractured and collapsed to the ground, but that was only the beginning.
Its ruins began to tremble and glow, at first faintly, then with an increasingly blinding light. That glow shifted rapidly, from sacred gold to a dark crimson, until it turned a blackish red that seemed soaked in dried blood.
All of a sudden, a beam of light exploded from the ruins, tearing violently through the sky before ripping the air and shooting toward the mountain’s peak.
It all happened in an instant, far too fast for anyone to comprehend. At the same moment the light appeared, an immense pressure crashed down over the entire area of the stone pillar.
The very air trembled, becoming heavy and suffocating.
Everyone present, without exception, was crushed to their knees.
Some began coughing blood, their bodies trembling, their faces twisted into masks of terror. A dark, malevolent force pressed on their guts like invisible claws tearing them apart from within.
"Shit... what the hell was that..." one of them muttered, his body shaking with spasms as he felt his internal injuries splitting open like wounds impossible to close.
Even Yun Hao, still standing, had his face drawn tight and his breath ragged. Every vein in his body seemed ready to burst under the oppression as he struggled to contain the internal injuries piling up under the immense pressure.
His gaze fixed on the sky, where the blackish red beam had faded. He couldn’t help but mutter hoarsely,
"And this... is supposed to be only a fraction of its power?"
The appearance of the beam was brief, vanishing as quickly as it had appeared. But some in nearby areas where it originated caught sight of it. Even though they were hundreds of meters away, a deep terror welled up in their hearts out of nowhere.
All of them immediately went on alert, wondering what it had been. Around them, the beasts in the area began to howl and growl, their instincts seemingly triggered by something unseen, adding to the chaos.
Many assumed some powerful beast had been unleashed in the area and began to retreat, but a few, those at the fifth stage, realized that whether it was a beast or not, it was certainly far stronger than they were.
That alone was enough to drive their panic even further.
They had already been shaken by the powerful shock that had just shaken the entire mountain, and while they were still struggling to digest that, another strange and terrifying event had occurred.
It was like an alarm bell ringing in their minds, making many start to question what was happening on that mountain.
While they panicked, near the tunnel’s exit, a figure entirely cloaked in a violet aura appeared.
It was Liang Yuexin, who had just barely escaped successfully from the place.
She had crossed the whole path in a single minute, far less than the thirty minutes it had taken her before when she went through it with Zhu Rong.
Even so, as soon as she emerged from it, she couldn’t help but glance back with worry etched across her face.
She had followed Zhu Rong’s plan and gotten out, but now that she had done it, she couldn’t help but feel uneasy and reconsider her decision.
Perhaps she should have stayed.
Perhaps she should have ignored Zhu Rong’s words and helped him fight that spirit, which was clearly stronger than both of them.
Her thoughts were chaotic, but she had no time to process them, as In the very next moment, she sensed a powerful fluctuation of elemental energy, and immediately the entire mountain trembled visibly as cracks opened up in the ground.
It lasted only a few seconds, but it was strong enough to cause considerable shaking across the mountain.
Standing near the tunnel, having sensed the fluctuation of elemental energy, she instantly understood what might have caused it.
One glance at the tunnel, now blocked by debris from its collapsed walls, confirmed her theory.
’No...’
A dark expression, mixed with conflicting emotions, appeared on her face as she began to realize what might have happened inside.
’He... chose to sacrifice himself to eliminate that creature.’