Chapter 230 - 222: The True Monarch Returns
Two streaks of Escape Light flew side by side, weaving through the shattered landscape of the Zombie Alliance Headquarters.
Along the way, sporadic bursts of Spiritual Light and fluctuations of Magical Power flared up as small-scale skirmishes continued to erupt.
"What did you steal their cauldron for?"
Qian Xin Master glanced at Qi Yun. Recalling how the man had just uprooted that Three-legged Giant Bronze Cauldron, he couldn’t help but smile in amusement.
"That cauldron’s material may be extraordinary, capable of holding and nurturing a Great Master’s Corpse Blood, but its core requires the Zombie Alliance’s secret Dharma Gate to operate. It needs to draw on the yin malevolence from the Earth Veins to harmonize the Corpse Qi and resentment.
"In the hands of an outsider, it’s just a dead object. At best, you could melt it down and use it as high-grade material for refining a yin-attribute Magical Artifact."
"I just have a feeling... it’ll be useful." Qi Yun’s gaze swept over the ravaged ruins below, his tone holding a barely perceptible trace of contemplation.
His intuition had always been precise.
The fact that he’d collected it on instinct meant there had to be a reason.
The territory of the Zombie Alliance Headquarters was vast. Although not as boundless as the Wuji Holy Sect’s Taixu Mirror Heaven, it could still be considered an expansive land.
Even after being sundered by the Vast Sea Dust True Monarch’s heaven-shattering technique of Extracting Essence, the great sect grounds had crumbled, its Earth Veins had been ripped out, and its Spiritual Mechanism had dissipated. Yet, countless fragments still remained, densely packed together.
Conflicts over opportunities, similar to their earlier fight for the Undying True Blood, were constantly playing out all over the ruins of the Zombie Alliance.
Countless Cultivators, from Qi Refining to Foundation Establishment, were frantically gnawing on the carcass of this dying leviathan, seizing every last bit of value.
Greed and slaughter became the main theme of these ruins.
However, no one noticed that at some unknown point, the color of the sky had quietly begun to change.
The Celestial Vault, originally murky and shattered from the great battle and the True Monarch’s intervention, was gradually being stained a strange, dusky yellow.
This yellow was not the warm glow of a sunset.
Rather, it was a dead, oppressive color, like that of dust accumulated over ten thousand ages, silently spreading to envelop the entire land.
In the center of this dusky yellow canopy, a mottled, ancient wooden coffin was quietly suspended.
The coffin looked ordinary, even somewhat dilapidated. The lacquer was peeling off, revealing the dark wood grain beneath.
It emanated no powerful aura, no pressure, no Spiritual Light. It just hung there, silent and still, like a single cold eye suspended high in the heavens, apathetically gazing down upon its former homeland now being carved up and consumed.
Strangely, of all the Cultivators below—whether they were Qi Refining Cultivators or Foundation Establishment Masters—not a single one looked up. None of them noticed the strange color enveloping Heaven and Earth, nor the presence of the Suspended Coffin.
Qi Yun, who was in the middle of discussing the next potential location of opportunity with Qian Xin Master, felt the Daluo Heaven within his body tremble without any warning.
A strange, indescribable feeling flickered through his heart.
Sensing something amiss, he subconsciously looked up at the sky.
A wisp of blue-gray radiance flashed in his eyes, gone in an instant.
The next moment, Qi Yun’s pupils contracted violently, and the calm expression on his face was replaced by an unprecedented gravity.
He grabbed the arm of the Qian Xin Master beside him, his grip so tight it startled the man.
"What’s wrong?" Qian Xin Master turned his head in confusion and followed Qi Yun’s gaze, but all he saw was the same dead, dusky yellow sky that he hadn’t found strange at all.
"Run!!"
Qi Yun didn’t explain, nor did he have time to.
The feeling that the mottled wooden coffin gave him was far deeper, more restrained, and also more... dangerous than the brilliant Sword Intent of the Vast Sea Dust True Monarch before.
This was a return, one that had been silent for eons, carrying with it endless sorrow and the intent of death!
He transformed into a fierce, decisive Vermilion Rainbow. The phantom of a Hundred Li Fire Cloud flashed and vanished behind him as the searing Nanming Li Fire Sword Intent enveloped Qian Xin Master, pushing their Tunneling Speed to the absolute limit!
BOOM!
A sonic boom cloud erupted in the air, and the space where the two had just been standing twisted slightly.
The Vermilion Rainbow was like a meteor tearing through the sky, heedless of direction, seeking only to escape.
In the blink of an eye, it had become a tiny speck of light on the horizon, having already fled a thousand li away!
Only after their Escape Light had completely vanished beyond the edge of perception did Qi Yun’s suppressed voice, like a cold wedge, drive itself fiercely into Qian Xin Master’s Sea of Consciousness:
"That True Monarch who traveled to the Outer Realm... he’s back!"
Hearing this, Qian Xin Master whipped his head around again, staring back at that dusky yellow Celestial Vault as he spread his Divine Sense with all his might.
This time, he finally caught a faint outline of the Suspended Coffin.
A chill shot up from his tailbone straight to the top of his skull!
"Just running won’t work!"
Qian Xin Master’s voice was hurried, fine beads of sweat forming on his temples. Not a trace of his usual composure remained.
"A True Monarch who has condensed a World-Residing Dharma Body has long since transcended mortal constraints. They can ignore the normal laws of karma, even reversing cause and effect.
"We are stained with the karma of the Zombie Alliance’s destruction and of plundering its treasures. Trying to rely on Tunneling Speed alone to escape a True Monarch’s perception is next to impossible!"
He spoke extremely quickly, with obvious terror in his voice.
No one could predict the terrifying and bizarre ways a True Monarch would unleash their heaven-storming fury after their lair was destroyed and their lineage pushed to the brink of extinction.
That was a power that the Foundation Establishment Realm could never hope to contend with.
"How do we cleanse it?" Qi Yun’s gaze was heavy. The Daluo Magical Power in his body surged relentlessly to maintain their maximum Tunneling Speed, yet his voice remained steady.
"Either we immediately return to the Holy Sect and ask for the Desolate Halberd True Monarch’s protection, using the Holy Sect Mountain Gate’s Grand Array and the True Monarch’s power to sever the karmic ties.
"Or..." Qian Xin Master gritted his teeth, a look of grim resolve flashing across his face.
"Then we’ll just have to rely on our luck!"
With a flip of his hand, the nine drops of Undying True Blood that he had just obtained and hadn’t even had time to warm appeared in his palm.