Redemption of a Born Demon

As they progressed, everyone realized the immense danger that lurked within this Grotto Heaven. So many Sleepers had fallen here; there were likely deadly traps left over from the ancient war between Earth Immortals.

They had come mentally prepared to some extent, but it was clear the situation far exceeded their expectations.

"Why don’t you all wait here for a bit? I’ll head into the mountain to scout things out."

Yi Beidou said after a moment of thought.

"Let’s find a safe spot at the foot of the mountain for the others to wait. We’ll go into the mountain with you."

Durand said.

The other Divine Sealing Leaders nodded in agreement.

They each had their own trump cards and were capable of protecting themselves. They felt it wasn’t right to always let Yi Beidou take the lead.

"Very well."

Yi Beidou didn’t object. With the top-secret intelligence the God-Sealing Alliance had accumulated over the years, these men could be of great help to him.

With the plan settled, the group continued forward, soon approaching a flat area at the foot of the mountain.

This area must have once been a plaza before a mountain gate. Though it was now overgrown with weeds, traces of the original structures were still visible.

From this vantage point, the area on the mountaintop shrouded in a rainbow-colored glow was no longer a blurry haze of light. The scenery above was now faintly discernible.

For the Saints present, their eyesight was unaffected by such a distance.

The mountaintop was an enormous platform, upon which palaces forged from white jade stood in cascading tiers. Faint, profound golden patterns could be seen within the white jade.

Today, large sections of these palaces had collapsed into ruin, but one could still imagine how magnificent and splendid the complex must have been in its heyday.

Bathed in the radiant glow, with light seeping through the walls and auspicious clouds enveloping it, it was truly a celestial palace, a dwelling for Immortals.

"Wait, look carefully at the top of the highest palace ruin. There seems to be something there. The source of all this light appears to be right there."

Zhou Qingchen said, pointing to the highest of the ruined palaces.

Everyone looked and saw he was right. The light there was at its most brilliant, so intense that it blurred the surrounding scenery, making it impossible to discern the source.

"Let me take a look."

Yi Beidou said.

FWOOM!!

The next moment, Demon Flame erupted around him, and the Blood-Colored Demon Flame converged within his eye sockets.

Breaking Illusion and Method, to glimpse true nature.

The outer layers of light were stripped away, but the very core remained obscured.

It was like trying to stare at a lightbulb with the naked eye—the filament at the core was impossible to make out because the light was simply too brilliant.

"Hm?"

Yi Beidou frowned slightly. ’A magnetic field so powerful that even the Blood-Colored Demon Flame can’t pierce it? Or is it some kind of energy cluster?’

’Then...’

The next moment, a terrifying sensation washed over the hearts of the crowd. This was especially true for the newly ascended Saints from Donghua, who felt their hair stand on end and couldn’t stop themselves from stumbling back several steps.

The Divine Sealing Leaders, Zhou Qingchen, and the others also seemed to sense something, instinctively backing away to create distance from Yi Beidou.

The Blood-Colored Demon Flame around Yi Beidou gradually darkened, finally turning as pitch-black as ink-jade.

Black Flame!!

’What in the world is that...’

The instant the Black Flame appeared, the young Saints reacted like startled hedgehogs, every hair on their bodies standing on end.

They were young and full of vigor, always forging ahead. They had ridden the tides of their era, transcended the masses to achieve Ascension. They considered themselves fearless and indomitable, having long cast aside all thoughts of life and death.

But in this moment, they felt a genuine, visceral fear.

It was the fear of a "tribulation"—one that could not be severed, escaped, or conquered.

Mountains could be crossed and heavens transcended, but there was no escaping one’s fate and its tribulations.

Empowered by the Black Flame, Yi Beidou’s Illusion Breaking ability was pushed to its absolute limit. In his vision, the indiscernible light source was tainted and then devoured by the Black Flame, revealing the truth within.

The moment he saw the truth of the light source, even the mentally prepared Yi Beidou couldn’t help but shudder.

"What did you see?"

Long Yichen asked urgently.

"A corpse... a headless corpse. It’s sitting cross-legged atop that palace. It’s the source of all the light."

Yi Beidou said softly, his gaze locked onto the top of the palace on the summit.

A jade-like body sat there, poised and still. It had no head upon its neck—only empty space—yet Yi Beidou could still feel a vast, ocean-like aura of life and energy emanating from it, as if it would never fade with the passage of time.

"What?!"

Everyone was stunned by his words.

The five leaders of the God-Sealing Alliance were especially shocked; their bodies went rigid and their pupils contracted to pinpoints, as if they had just heard something utterly terrifying.

’A physical body capable of generating such terrifying power...’

"Fall back! We absolutely cannot enter the mountain! That’s the corpse of an ancient Earth Immortal!"

Durand’s voice trembled as he spoke.

"The corpse of an ancient Earth Immortal retains its instincts even in death! It can even use some of the abilities it had in life. Our God-Sealing Alliance has records of this. One mentioned that the dismembered arm of an ancient Earth Immortal was able to perform some kind of Seal Technique, causing the deaths of numerous people who tried to claim it."

"And the Earth Immortal corpses we’ve found so far have almost all been fragmented remains; it’s rare to find one that’s more than thirty percent complete! If this Earth Immortal’s corpse here in the Grotto Heaven is whole aside from its head, then it’s at least seventy percent complete!"

"An Earth Immortal’s corpse this complete would have power far exceeding any known Sleeper! The completeness of its retained instincts would be beyond our imagination. In a way, you could even call it a true Earth Immortal—one that has lost its consciousness but retained all of its instincts!"