Chapter 78: Heaven and Earth Reversed in an Instant
The Sea Demons were an exceedingly strange species. If one were to classify them, they could be counted among the Demon Race.
They lived in groups and fed on fish.
Ordinarily, Sea Demons would never attack humans. Yet today, this swarm seed to have gone mad, surging forward to bite and devour a whale.
The sea waves receded.
What appeared before them was a horde of blue-skinned, humanoid monsters with twin fins growing from their backs.
They clutched bone forks in their hands, shrieking in an incomprehensible tongue as they lunged onto the whale’s back.
Soon, the Sea Demons and the cultivators were entangled in chaotic battle.
In the midst of the turmoil, Xiao Hai, clutching the morial tablet, hid in panic. He could feel it trembling in his arms and let out a bitter laugh. “Ancestor, stop moving. I’m about to die here.”
The whale let out a pained cry and turned over abruptly.
Those riding on its back either fell directly into the sea or hastily summoned their magic tools to stand upon the water.
No one knew when it began, but a milky-white fog had spread all around.
Lu Changyuan frowned. “These Sea Demons... have they been corrupted by the Desire Demon?”
The Desire Demon did not only taint cultivators.
Once a demon beast gained intelligence and developed desire, it too had to beware of such corruption.
The Sea Demons that ca charging had eyes glowing scarlet, clearly stained by the Desire Demon’s taint.
If it were only one or two, it would not have mattered. But hundreds—thousands—of them had all been corrupted?
Lu Changyuan lifted Severed Thought, cleaving one Sea Demon cleanly in half. Blue blood dripped upon the whale’s back, corroding its flesh. “No,” Lu Changyuan said, “it’s not the Desire Demon. It’s the Nether Kingdom. The aura of the Nether enters the body and makes all beings yearn for death.”
The Nether Kingdom was a realm ford by the Lord of the Nether through the gathering of the “death,” “spirit,” and “resentnt” of all living beings.
Those whose will was not strong enough would be devoured by its aura and beco one of the Nether’s “spirits,” forever trapped between life and death.
Rip—
Not far away, a cultivator clutched his head, then drew his sword and sliced it off himself.
The remaining half of his body swayed in the air before collapsing with a heavy thud.
Yet that was not the end.
From within his corpse sprouted countless fleshy tendrils, which soon crawled out, rging into the fog.
Another whale’s cry echoed.
The Swallowing-Heaven Whale of the Beast-Taming Palace closed its eyes forever and sank beneath the sea.
It was said that whales were the oldest beings in the world, their voices etched into the Dao of Life and Death itself. So legends claid that if one could hear a whale’s death cry at the mont of its passing, they could glimpse the bygone ages of the world.
Boom!
Heaven and earth seed to reverse for an instant.
A hazy pillar shot skyward from where the whale had died. In the mist, sothing began circling the pillar, vast and shadowy, resembling an enormous bird that blotted out the sun.
“Fall back!”
Lu Changyuan grabbed Su Youwan’s hand and dashed backward over the water.
Before long, where they had stood monts earlier, countless bones erged—human bones, demon bones, even the skeletal remains of a colossal serpent stretching for miles.
The bones were rising from the sea to pave the surface?
Lu Changyuan had no ti to ponder. He lifted his sword once more, beheading another Sea Demon, and leapt back swiftly.
“Sothing’s not right.”
This Nether Kingdom was not the sa.
Lu Changyuan had only entered it once before—at the beginning of his cultivation path, when Daoist Chang’an had entered the Dao at fifty years old and was cast into an opened Nether Kingdom.
He had remained within for a full hundred years.
Yet that ti, the Nether’s opening had been far less grand than this.
No—
Even in all records of the Nether Kingdom’s openings, none had ever shown such scale.
Lu Changyuan rembered that the entrance to the Nether should appear at the center of the sea.
When the sun split in two—half black, half white—a phantom gate would appear between heaven and earth. Stepping through that gate ant entering the Nether Kingdom.
Though each opening differed slightly, all shared this core feature—the gate must appear.
But this ti, there was no gate at all. Instead, the all-encompassing mist made it impossible to discern any direction.
The Third Princess said, “Young Master Lu, this mist is draining our life force.”
“Keep retreating!”
Through the thick white fog ca an eerie howl, as if so ancient creature from the primordial ages had left behind its voice, echoing across ti to manifest in this very mont.
“Don’t let go of my hand.”
The mist persisted—Nether energy condensed into fog that filled the sea, swallowing everyone within.
The Third Princess softly replied, “Alright.”
Suddenly, Lu Changyuan felt as though he was stepping on solid ground.
He lowered his gaze.
White bones.
A path built from white bones stretched beneath their feet, lined on either side by flickering blue flas, faintly lighting their way.
The mist abruptly cleared, and when they looked up again, the sun was gone. Only a black-and-white sphere hung in the sky.
The heavens were completely devoured by darkness—as though sared with black dye. The original sky was forcibly covered over, and even the sword mark of Sword Solitary Sun had vanished without a trace.
Between life and death—there lay the Nether Kingdom.
“Young Master Lu, don’t move.”
“Hm?”
The silver-haired girl suddenly leaned closer, examining Lu Changyuan carefully, then lifted her hands to cradle his face.
“Third Royal Highness?”
“I thought I just saw... red light in Young Master Lu’s eyes.”
Lu Changyuan couldn’t help but chuckle. “Red light? Are you saying I’ve beco like Your Highness?”
Red eyes ant corruption by the Desire Demon.
Su Youwan shook her head. “Perhaps I saw wrong.”
“Co, Third Princess. Let’s see where this White Bone Path leads.”
The Nether Kingdom had two roads—
One was the Road of Life.
The other, the Road of Death.
Lu Changyuan had once walked the Road of Death and turned it into life. And now, the Road of Life was the one beneath his and Su Youwan’s feet.
A flicker of interest lit his eyes.
The Road of Life had long been rumored, but never recorded. This, then, was sothing new.
“Young Master Lu seems quite familiar with this path?”
“Not exactly,” he replied. “But within the Nether lies a stone stele that reads: Those who walk the Road of Life are the guiltless and may pay audience to the Lord of the Nether.”
The silver-haired girl hesitated. “Since there is a Road of Life, what of the Road of Death?”
Lu Changyuan smiled faintly. “Those who walk the Road of Death are the guilty. Should they complete it, they shall earn pardon. Of course, the Nether Kingdom has long been shattered—those two roads no longer serve their original purpose.”
Su Youwan had also heard so stories of the Nether Kingdom. “But the Lord of the Nether should already be dead.”
“No,” Lu Changyuan said, “most likely, the Lord of the Nether still lives.”
He continued, “The citizens of the Nether have waited between life and death for a thousand years. In the end, they will welco back their king.”
“Young Master Lu sounds like a storyteller now. How can the dead be revived?”
Between life and death lies the Dao.
Death, too, could be called returning to the Dao.
No being in this world had ever truly returned from death.
Lu Changyuan spoke softly, “At the very least, I believe it. The Dao that the Lord of the Nether proved—was called... Death.”
Reviews
All reviews (0)