Imperial God Emperor

Bones?

Ye Qingyu was secretly pleased.

Are they also vestiges of the battle?

He promptly walked over and examined them carefully.

"These bones..." He frowned slightly upon noticing several strange features on these broken bones. Although their basic structure was similar to the Human Race's, they were bigger by many times than those of humans, and even outsized the Brute Race's, which was the tallest and burliest race he had ever seen.

Even weirder was that unlike the white bones of most dead beings, these bones were completely pitch black and emitted a bizarre metallic radiance, appearing as if they were cast from black iron.

Ye Qingyu casually picked up two giant bones which felt like they weighed several tons in his hands, and which gave off a metallic collision sound upon the slightest knock. Careful examination told him that these bones were at least several hundred thousand years old and as solid as divine iron, and that a faint demon qi circulated within.

These bones are from neither humans nor brutes, yet their structure is similar to ours. What race could they be from?

He then examined the fragmented bones all over the ground and found that some were still intact. Seeing that arm and leg bones were present but finding no skulls, a scary thought suddenly popped up in his mind.

Could these be the bones of the God and the Fiendgod Races?

This was one heck of an idea indeed.

Probably not. According to the legends, these two races are naturally everlasting and their exterior appearances are similar to humans', but their bones aren't black... This is certainly weird.

Ye Qingyu shook his head.

He proceeded forward along the destroyed walls and rubble and carefully examined the bones scattered in each place. Subsequently, he estimated that six to seven complete skeletons could be put together.

Connecting these discoveries to the battle vestiges he saw in the ruins earlier, he could vaguely guess what had happened in this area - a godlike expert had slain the seven owners of these mysterious skeletons in no time, and the aftermath caused those palaces and pavilions to be destroyed.

Exactly what race are these skeletons from while they were alive?

From the looks of these skeletons, the race must have been so terrifyingly powerful that even Saints were not their match. Thus, the burning question was what kind of heaven-defying expert could have exerted such a powerful blow to kill them all in a single instant.

The more Ye Qingyu thought, the harder his heart palpitated. He then felt an irresistible twitch from the ends of his hair to his fingertips.

In his view, the strength of that expert had certainly attained the Heaven-Defying Realm. Any other expert would have involuntarily felt aghast witnessing the scene that was in front of Ye Qingyu at the moment.

Could it have been those supreme Heaven's pridelings, who have forced their way into the Door of Darkness over the past hundred thousand years?

In particular, could it have been that human quasi-emperor Li Xiaofei?

A scene seemed to arise in his mind at this very moment, depicting many legendary characters who had successfully entered the Door of Darkness.

After sweeping another glance across the huge stretch of ruins, he seemed to think of something once again. Revealing a puzzled expression, he muttered to himself, "Strange, I keep feeling that something's missing... did I neglect something?"

Pushing away several collapsed rocks, he carefully examined the place as he walked deeper into the ruins.

Right! The wordless tablets! Where are they?

He suddenly realized something.

In conformity to the layout of all the buildings he had seen along this road, there should be wordless tombstones in the spaces between these palaces. Yet, he had not seen any standing upright in these ruins.

After searching, he finally found two dark gray fractured and overlapping pieces of broken stone at the edge of the ruins. They were indeed similar in material to the wordless tombstones he had seen.

After pushing the broken stone pieces aside, what he saw was all the more shocking.

These stone pieces were indeed broken wordless tombstones. After they were smashed, a meter-wide hole opened up on the ground where the tombstones had stood.

The hole was deep and dark, and, much like a bottomless abyss, there was no indication where it led to.

An extremely intense Yin qi, akin to an age-old ice qi, surged out from the hole, causing one to shudder as if it was from the Ninth Hell's joy at death. Ye Qingyu would have been half-frozen at that very instant when he was near to it if it was not for the fact that he had cultivated ice yuan qi and was protected by the [Supreme Ice Flame] power.

He cautiously drew close to the cave and inspected it carefully.

He soon discovered something new.

"These marks..." He noticed that there were several strange marks, which looked like they had been scratched out by the claws of a wild beast, left on the interior walls of the tombstone hole and on certain parts of the ground. They were easy to miss if one did not look carefully, and appeared increasingly strange and terrifying as he crouched down to scrutinize. "These marks... huh? Why does it seem as though something... crawled out from within?"

It's as if something scrabbled its way out of the hole. Were those marks left by an undead being from underground?

He tried using his strength to leave a mark on the walls but found that it was very difficult and near-impossible.

Strange.

Terrifying.

He became increasingly fearful as he looked on.

He had an impulse to enter this hole to investigate but ultimately held himself back, for he had sensed that infinite murderous spirit was contained within.

He spent a subsequent period of time flipping through all of the dark gray stones in the ruins.

As he expected, the original positions of the wordless tombstones were buried under these stones and had become large bottomless holes which were more than a meter in diameter. Their interior walls were as crude as those of holes dug by grave robbers and were densely strewn with scratch marks, giving one the feeling that countless demons from the Ninth Hell had frenziedly crawled their way out.

What was even weirder was the fact that there were exactly seven of these tombstone holes!

Seven collapsed tombstones, seven bottomless dark caves, and seven bizarre black skeletons of an unknown origin...

Ye Qingyu's hair stood on end for a while.

He did not believe that this was a coincidence.

Making another connection to the numerous wordless tombstones he had seen along the way, he instantly felt those strange chilly winds blowing like fine needles into his own marrow and bone sutures, and wondered if those black wordless tombstones were suppressing some kind of monster.

If they break their way out of the ground, then...

He had a new impulse to get out of this place as fast as he could.

In the meantime.

The Celestial Phoenix Maiden, who had been standing on the spirit path all this time, walked over.

She stood by Ye Qingyu's side in front of another tombstone with her battle dress and hair fluttering in the wind, her body giving off a mild orchid scent, and the fair skin on her neck shining faintly. It was unfortunate that the looks of this peerlessly attractive person could not be seen, for they were concealed by a bizarre Phoenix mask that added to her mystique.

She stared and scrutinized one of these pitch-black holes for a good while.

Although Ye Qingyu could not see her facial expressions because of the mask, he could perceive that an inexplicable dismay had flashed across her originally chilly eyes.

Several dozen breaths later.

"Let's go." The maiden shifted her gaze and let out a sigh before she turned and walked toward the spirit path.

Ye Qingyu opened his mouth slightly as if he wanted to hold her back and ask her a few questions, but simply nodded to himself the very next moment. Knowing the temperament of this female Heaven's pride, he was unable to ask anything and thus caught up to her in quick steps.

The one thing he could be sure of was that since entering the realm until the present ruins, the Celestial Phoenix Maiden's eyes betrayed the fact that she knew something.

The two figures continued walking along the spirit path in a single file for another thirty minutes or so.

Ye Qingyu's gaze suddenly froze.

An even larger stretch of ruins than before appeared no more than a hundred meters to the left of the spirt path!

A giant and complete palm print had been directly stamped on the ground, causing the entire stratum to sink by a full meter, while dozens of palaces and pavilions had collapsed around it. Broken stones and walls were scattered everywhere together with mysterious black skeletons.

This place had apparently also gone through a battle, just like the earlier ruins.

Similarly, a singular palm force had slain the owners of these mysterious skeletons instantly, and the aftermath brought down dozens of high-rise palaces.

Ye Qingyu walked into the ruins and began to inspect it.

Indeed!

There were also large holes which emitted a ghastly chill beneath several collapsed dark gray tombstones. After flipping through and tallying every single tombstone and scattered skeleton, he discovered that their numbers were identical as before.

Judging from the style of the battle, it's clearly the same matchless expert who caused these battle vestiges...

The terrifying power which could burst out instantly from a palm print like this once more allowed Ye Qingyu to feel the dreadful might of the culprit and exceeded the level of strength he could comprehend.

For the subsequent two hours.

The duo remained silent as they advanced along the spirit path.

It seemed as if no matter how long they walked for, the road ahead led endlessly into the darkness.

The more Ye Qingyu walked, the more he was amazed by the expanse of this mysterious plane that was made up of palaces, pavilions, divine statues, and tombstones, which seemed to be boundless.

There are ruins ahead once more...

Only several kilometers removed from the earlier ruins, Ye Qingyu saw that in the distance was an even larger ruin touched by battle which he estimated to cover at least a five-kilometer-area.

The battle which took place there must have been even scarier...

After running his eyes over the ruins, he noticed not only that there were ankle-deep heaps of powdered rock, but also that the buildings which had been battered by the aftermath were completely uprooted.

On the mud layer all around could be seen several large Yin qi-spouting holes which had become exposed after the tombstones were pulverized.

The giant black skeletons which were scattered everywhere were even more fragmented than those before, such that many of them were nearly unidentifiable.

After his inspection, Ye Qingyu slowly walked back onto the spirit path with a thoughtful expression on his face.

Including this one, he had already discovered seventeen battle ruins along the road.

Moreover, on the road that was to come, the battle vestiges, which originally appeared every five kilometers or so, now inevitably appeared within every kilometer.

It was as if these battles took place with a greater frequency in the deeper parts of this plane.

The scale of the collapsed ruins also grew bigger. Ye Qingyu had already passed through two battle ruins which stretched several over a dozen kilometer area and had been subject to a shockingly massive aftermath.

Every time he passed by some ruins, he would carefully examine the marks and clues left behind by the battle.

He gradually realized that although the location, scale, and degree of destruction of the battle in each place were different, there were also several identical signs.

First, judging from the residual aura and the marks created by the culprit, every battle took place a very long time ago that was at least several hundred thousand years before the present.

Furthermore, most of the buildings had been turned into lumps and bits.

In other words, a highly terrifying power had been unleashed during each battle.

This kind of power would not only destroy the Heaven Wasteland Domain with utmost ease but also turn any of the first ten districts of the Black Demon Abyss into ruins in a moment's time.

Given Ye Qingyu's current strength, battling such an expert, who could be said to possess Great Dao-level abilities, would be akin to a river competing with an ocean or a the shine of a distant star competing with the sun.

Besides, at every battle ruin, he saw collapsed tombstones and the holes concealed beneath their fragments, as well as an equivalent number of huge and mysterious black skeletons which emitted a faint demonic aura.

...

On the spirit path.

The Celestial Phoenix Maiden unhurriedly walked in front of Ye Qingyu all this time.

Throughout the journey, she would only pause briefly when Ye Qingyu went to inspect the ruins, and would occasionally catch two glimpses of the surrounding buildings.

Most of the time, however, she would simply proceed along the spirit path aimlessly in a calm and relaxed manner, resembling a seclusive fairy who had come for a sightseeing trip.

Ye Qingyu also grew suspicious upon seeing her behavior.

In order to find the large opportunities hidden in the 18th district, those super powerful sects went to great pains and set up all kinds of schemes to open the Doors of Life of the Doors of Darkness using the blood of experts.

However, on the journey thus far, Ye Qingyu had not found any trace of heavenly treasures, save for a boundless stretch of desolate palaces and pavilions and densely packed tombstones, as well as the battle vestiges which appeared along the way.

To put things bluntly, only the Dao essence law-containing lines on those mythological beast sculptures which appeared at the very start could be considered highly beneficial opportunities for cultivation.

Yet, the Celestial Phoenix Maiden did not even take a side glimpse at those sculptures when she passed by.

This could only mean that she was looking for something else.

Of course, despite being baffled by her behavior, Ye Qingyu did not ask her anything, knowing that he would simply be rebuffed.

Furthermore, he was currently preoccupied with the fact that the further he walked, the likelier that some unexpected danger would be lurking, if the increasingly frequent appearance of the battle vestiges was anything to go by.

...

Thirty minutes later.

"These ruins..." Pausing his footsteps and peering at the distance, a shock abruptly emerged in his eyes.

Ahead of him was yet another battle ruin, which precursors along the divine way could be said to have been turned upside down and destroyed. Yet, these particular ruins that stretched close to a hundred kilometers were in such a tragic state that his heart skipped a beat just looking at them.

All of the buildings within this stretch of ruins had been violently brought down, leaving huge stones and volcanic ash-like powder scattered everywhere. It looked as though an earthquake had taken place here.

Residual aura gently undulated like ripples in the air above.

Even though tens of thousands of years had gone by, a terrifying ancient power still filled the air.

Furthermore, Void rifts which resembled strips of broken cloth had been torn in between the multiple pervasive layers of energy ripples.

Extremely strange wisps of evil qi and cruel qi twined around these rifts, causing one to feel inexplicably fearful.

Ye Qingyu stood beside the ruins and inspected for some time before he walked toward the middle of the battlefield while carefully running his eyes across the collapsed buildings in all directions.

He noticed that, on the far side of the battlefield, there were several collapsed buildings whose rubble was different from those in the previous ruins.

Some of the stones were relatively intact and could be vaguely identified as the main body of towers and palaces. They had been neatly cleaved by a large and sharp weapon that delivered a moment's worth of absolute force. Some other towers and pavilions by the roadside had their top halves sliced off while giant claw marks could be seen on the remaining bottom half.

Ye Qingyu walked up beside a collapsed wall which had more than a meter left still standing and examined it closely. He noticed that traces of an extremely ancient demonic aura lingered among the broken stones.

Just then...

Why, that's...

His countenance turned cold as his eyes were lost among the ruins.

He was gazing fixedly at the centermost part of the battlefield in the distance.

There's someone over there!

To put things more descriptively, it was a figure sitting cross-legged on a ten-meter-odd black rock in the middle of the ruins.

It was tall and upright, and its body seemed to be that of a human from afar. It wore ancient, dark-colored armor and battle garments, and its hoary hair which was several dozen meters long drooped down to the ground below while fluttering gently in the wind. An extremely strange sight it was indeed.

The person simply sat silently and motionlessly like a statue.

However, Ye Qingyu was certain that it was not a statue.

For the first time since entering the 18th district, he at long last saw a complete figure, and one that seemed to be living.

He began to tense up inwardly.

He drew closer to it step after step.

The closer he got, the clearer he could see.

It was indeed a human figure.

The only problem was that the figure's face was unidentifiable as it was concealed by the thick and long hoary hair. From afar, all that could be seen was that the figure was sitting on a rock mound heaped together from tiny bits and powder, and that an indistinct power lingered around it like gently floating ripples.

Is he alive?

Who could it be?

Could it be the person who destroyed the ancient fiendgod cities and massacred their inhabitants, leaving behind all these ruins?

Ye Qingyu was bewildered.

After hesitating for several breaths' worth of time, he decided to continue walking over to the figure.

He paused his footsteps once more when he reached within approximately fifty meters of the person.

"Senior?"

He did not dare to impetuously get too close to the figure in the middle of the battlefield. Instead, he stood several dozen meters away beside the broken walls of a palace and probed cautiously.

But the figure did not respond to him.

A wind blew softly.

The long hair fluttered.

No sound.

"Senior... senior?" Ye Qingyu tried again after a brief hesitation.

But there was still no response.

Sitting motionlessly where it was, the figure did not offer any response no matter how Ye Qingyu probed. There was also not the slightest change to its figure or the energy lingering around it.

"He's already dead,"  voice which was calm, chilly, and toneless was heard.

It was a sudden utterance of the Celestial Phoenix Maiden.

Ye Qingyu was taken slightly aback.

Dead?

Surely that can't be?

Why is there an aura lingering around it if so?

He took a glance at the Celestial Phoenix Maiden to make sure that she was not kidding. Then, clenching his teeth, he walked briskly to the center of the battlefield and discovered upon careful examination that there was indeed no sign of a pulse or breath of life in the body of this human-like being.

He's dead for real.

And has been that way for many, many years.

However, Ye Qingyu became more and more astounded as he gazed at the body. Although there was no sign of life within, an extremely powerful yuan qi continued to undulate and circulate in the body indistinctly.

How is this possible?

Gosh, how terrifying must this person's strength have been when he was alive for such a powerful aura to remain even after his death?

A tinge of respect showed in his eyes.

A windy sound was heard as a breeze which gave off a faint purple mist swept delicately across the figure.

The breeze brushed against the figure's hair.

The hoary hair was raised, allowing the duo to see the face of the mysterious dead person.

It belonged to a young expert.

The lean and well-defined face had brows that arched like the contours of distant hills, a high and sharp nose, and cherry-colored lips. It had the calmness of a deity, and although its eyes were gently closed, there was an elegance and a nobility in its bearing.

In particular, spring-like drops of mist circulated within an aqua-blue, needlepoint-sized forehead mole which was replete with spiritual essence, as if it was the origin of all things.

The figure's face did not show the slightest sign of decay, and a blood color could still be seen through the skin.

It seemed as though, rather than being dead, he had fallen into an eternal sleep.

The sound of the wind grew louder.

As the gale brushed against the long hair, the dark-colored armor on the figure's body also came into full view.

The surface of the scale armor was engraved with inscriptions of an ancient era, while wisps of indistinct formations of water marks and auras circulated within. Although it was damaged, Ye Qingyu could still feel its former might from the strands of energy and aura within.

Lowering his sight, Ye Qingyu noticed a saber at the waist of the mysterious figure.

-

It was more than three feet in length and half a foot in width, and dark blue lines were engraved on its blade. Two gems which gave off a watery splendor were also inlaid on its scaly hilt.

Two phalanx-sized words were carved on the middle section of the scabbard.

This is... Lan... Li?

Lan Li?

The sword is called the [Sword of the South]?

The person is called Lan Li?

Ye Qingyu was somewhat puzzled.

He did not remember a person named Lan Li appearing in the legends that depicted the supreme talents who had entered the 18th district, and had never heard of a divine weapon called the [Sword of the South].

Moreover, he vaguely noticed that, unlike the armor which had decayed, broken, and lost its spiritual qi, the longsword still contained a completely intact formation aura whose power continued to throb tremendously. Evidently, the longsword had remained undamaged and preserved its original appearance despite the corrosion of time.

It was certainly not of a common origin.

He gazed fixedly at the sword for a long time, but the instant he shifted his eyes away, he was taken abruptly aback.

What? Are those... seven fingers?

To his consternation, there were seven fingers attached to each hand propped on the mysterious expert's knees!

The Seven Fingers Race?!