NOVPUB
Chapter 797: Chapter 803: Madness
After shattering the fourth-order puppet, Li Zhirui advanced deeper into the tunnel and had not gone far before he came upon a perfectly sealed Jade Box.
"How many years ago must this relic be from that Spiritual Objects can still be preserved?"
Li Zhirui used vines to open the jade box and glimpsed the spiritual object inside. Although its luster had faded considerably, it had not completely lost its Spiritual Energy, which surprised him.
This method was truly formidable!
The same went for that fourth-order puppet. After so many years, it could still exert its full strength.
Inside the Jade Box was a fourth-order fire-attribute Spiritual Object, neither a Spirit Seed nor a match for Li Zhirui’s Spiritual Root, rendering it useless to him.
However, reaching this point did not mark the end of the tunnel. Li Zhirui looked up and could not see the end; he could only keep moving forward.
But in a brief moment, Li Zhirui encountered another puppet, a fifth-order beast-shaped puppet!
Roar—
As Li Zhirui entered the puppet’s attack range, it was instantly activated, as if a fifth-order White Tiger appeared before him.
"You have mana but no realm and still dare to act ferociously in front of me?" Li Zhirui’s eyes held disdain as he gathered the Purification Principle in a flick of his hand, forming an unbreakable rope that bound the puppet, preventing it from escaping no matter how it struggled.
While the fifth-order puppet might be invincible against other Cultivators, it was powerless before the Laws, just like those Nascent Soul Cultivators!
This time, Li Zhirui chose not to smash the puppet to pieces. Instead, he carefully searched its body, locating the core where the Spirit Stones were placed, and took them out.
After all, regardless of anything else, this was a puppet fashioned out of fifth-order Spirit Materials. Though it might not pose a threat to Nascent Soul Cultivators, it still possessed an unparalleled deterrent force against other Cultivators!
"What is this?"
Li Zhirui looked down at the unique-shaped crystal in his hand, emitting a multicolored Spirit Light, his eyes reflecting curiosity and confusion.
Regarding the amount of Spiritual Energy contained, the Multicolored Crystal Stone was ten times denser than a top-grade Spirit Stone! Logically, it could be called an exquisite Spirit Stone.
However, the issue was that the Profound Origin Realm did not recognize the concept of an exquisite Spirit Stone.
"Had I known the puppets were powered by such crystals, I should have been gentler earlier." Despite not knowing what it was, there was no doubt it was a treasure, and Li Zhirui regretted acting too harshly, having smashed the fourth-order puppet to pieces. 𝒏𝙤𝙫𝒑𝙪𝙗.𝙘𝒐𝙢
Stowing the crystal and the puppet away, Li Zhirui continued walking deeper into the tunnel.
After a short while, Li Zhirui saw a ’Jade Case.’ Upon opening it with vines, he discovered it was filled with the Multicolored Crystal Stones he had just found!
The dazzlingly brilliant crystals brightened the previously pitch-black tunnel significantly.
Li Zhirui did a rough count, estimating there to be about fifty stones.
Judging by the conversion of one crystal to ten top-grade Spirit Stones, these stones were worth five million lower-grade Spirit Stones! This was a tremendously large fortune.
Progressing, Li Zhirui didn’t encounter any more puppets, but the tunnel was exceedingly long. He walked for half an hour before arriving at a stone gate, carved with the images of colors of dawn and Ascension, where one person achieving enlightenment led to the Ascension of all.
From a distance, Li Zhirui used several vines to easily push the stone gate open, revealing only darkness inside, where he could see nothing clearly.
Keep in mind, with Li Zhirui’s current cultivation, seeing in the dark should not be an issue, yet he was unable to discern what lay beyond the stone gate.
He had no choice but to cast a Brightness Spell, dispelling the darkness. Under the illumination of the bright light, even Li Zhirui, with his experience and temperament, was startled by the scene before him.
As far as the eye could see, there were only white bones worn down by time, leaving behind mere fragments. The dense array of bones not only filled the spacious underground palace but also piled up to a height of one zhang!
The sheer number of these bones, worn by countless years, was chilling, not to mention the many more bones that had been reduced to dust by the relentless flow of time.
"Could it be that the cultivators who disappeared according to the rumors all died in this underground palace?"
Li Zhirui furrowed his brows and muttered to himself, "Who set up the puppets outside, and why do such a thing?"
Given the bizarre circumstances within the underground palace, Li Zhirui did not venture in personally. Instead, he used slender tendrils as his eyes to explore the palace.
"This underground palace is too vast, isn’t it?"
Li Zhirui had already brought forth thousands of tendrils before he could touch the edge of the underground palace. After estimating in his mind, he discovered the palace stretched ten li from east to west!
No wonder it could accommodate so many cultivators.
After a long period of probing, Li Zhirui managed to retrieve a few items with the tendrils from the palace and learned a bit about the situation.
In the very center of the underground palace stood nine tall stone pillars, carved with many patterns but incomplete. Radiating outward from these, at regular intervals, were sets of nine identical pillars, totaling eighty-one.
Beyond that were several items taken from inside, all of which were well-preserved jade boxes.
Li Zhirui casually opened one of them. Inside was a Jade Slip. He extended a strand of his Divine Sense cautiously into the Jade Slip, and after encountering no danger, he began to read its content.
"What a wildly ambitious idea! And to think it garnered the agreement of so many cultivators!" After a while, Li Zhirui exclaimed with a note of astonishment upon seeing the content of the Jade Slip.
This Jade Slip revealed why they had gathered there, all because of an Ascension plan proposed by a Nascent Soul Cultivator that promised ’when one attains the Dao, all associated ascend together.’
Put simply, that person believed that if a Nascent Soul successfully transcended the Thunder Tribulation, they were about to Ascend, and they could use the power of a Formation to bring along all the cultivators together.
This seemingly far-fetched plan actually received the agreement of many cultivators, including some notable Nascent Souls.
Then the plan was put into action. Countless cultivators toiled for it, and after spending over a hundred years and numerous resources, they perfected what was called the Nine Heavens Profound Ascension Great Array, a sixth-order formation surpassing the limits of the Profound Origin Realm!
A decade or so later, someone began their tribulation and managed to withstand the Ascension Thunder Tribulation.
With the preliminary conditions of the plan achieved, they only needed to use the formation to bond the innumerable cultivators with the Ascenders, and they could all ascend together.
Whether the plan was successful or not is clear from the corpses strewn all over the ground.
As for why this place, once the most prosperous and rich in spiritual energy within the Profound Origin Realm, turned into the desolate and spirit-deficient Huanggu State, it was the mischief of the Ascension Great Array.
Because the Spirit Stones required for a sixth-order Great Array were so vast that even the collective resources of all participants could not fulfill the demand; to ensure the formation’s infallibility, they connected it directly to a multitude of Spirit Veins.
After all, as long as they succeeded in Ascension, they could leave the Profound Origin Realm. What did it matter if the Spirit Veins were exhausted?
Alas, they failed, and the reason was not clear.
Even though their plan failed, the Great Array activated, draining a massive amount of Spirit Veins. In an instant, the verdant mountains and rivers turned into quicksand, swallowing the mountain gates and territories of the cultivators, creating the present-day Huanggu State.
