Splitting the Heave

The sound of water dripping from her wet clothes echoed through the cavern as she dragged herself out of the pool. 

“Shang Xia, did you do that on purpose?!” She growled while stepping out of the water.

Shang Xia calmly sliced the nails off the rank three corpse and cried out indignantly, “Of course not! Senior Sister, you knew how urgent the situation was previously. That’s a rank three undead corpse we’re talking about! How was I supposed to know where to throw you while cutting off its head?” 

Sun Haiwei stared at him suspiciously before looking for a sunny spot to dry herself off. Taking out a pill that was the size of her thumbnail, she swallowed it quickly.

“Senior Sister Sun, is that an antidote? Can it cure the poison of rank three undead corpses?” Shang Xia asked in concern.

Glancing at him from the corner of his eye, she muttered, “Relax… Just protect me while I try to force the poison out of my body. During this time, I cannot be disturbed!” 

Shang Xia retrieved the final nail off the corpse’s body before smiling happily, “Of course! I’ll do everything you say!” 

When he spoke, Sun Haiwei had already closed her eyes and started circulating her inner qi. Faint fluctuations of heaven and earth qi appeared around her body.

The part of her face that was revealed to Shang Xia seemed to flush a gentle pink and she seemed a lot more ladylike than before. The headstrong teacher in the institution was nowhere to be seen at the moment. 

Her actions showed how much she trusted Shang Xia. She was confident that he would protect her while she was recovering.

As Shang Xia admired her looks from the side, she seemed to have felt his gaze as she snapped, “The rank three undead corpse is full of treasures. Its nails aren’t the only thing of value. Its bones should be comparable to rank two treasures after absorbing so much heaven and earth qi…” 

It was true. After all, Shang Xia failed to cut through the corpse’s arms when he used his mid-grade weapon initially. That alone proved how strong its body was.

Turning to look at the messy and tattered corpse lying against the wall, Shang Xia was too lazy to dig out its bones right away. He went to the side and started to recover his inner qi before trying anything new.

Sitting down, he continued to pay attention to his surroundings as Sun Haiwei was still expunging the poison from her body. He played with a piece of vermillion-colored plaque in his hand. The material it was made from was pretty unique as it was something between gold and jade.

He obtained the plaque after killing the undead corpse, and it seemed as though it was the only thing of value the body carried.

There were four words carved into the face of the plaque, ‘You Continent Zhu Family’, and there was a single word carved into the back, ‘Kuang’.

“Zhu Kuang of the Zhu Family?” Shang Xia muttered under his breath. “If this is truly the identity plaque of the undead corpse, this might actually be the famed Vermillion Plaque of the You Continent’s Zhu Family!” 

Shang Xia tried his best to recall everything about the Zhu Family and all sorts of guesses formed in his mind.

A quick look at tinyurl.com/2p9emv8w will leave you more fulfilled.

Before the two worlds collided, the Zhu Family was the strongest among the five great families that ruled the You Continent!

In that period of time, the Shang Clan was a second-rate power. They weren’t as strong as the five great families, but they were close.

If the records in the institution and the Shang Clan were true, only direct descendants of the Zhu Family would be able to obtain a Vermillion Plaque! 

Seeing as the battlefield between the two worlds had already existed for twenty years, the undead corpse that was called Zhu Kuang should be of the same seniority as his grandfather!

During the collisions of the worlds, no one knew why, but the Zhu Family was completely destroyed! The only ones who managed to escape were the peripheral members of the Zhu Family. They could barely be considered descendants of the Zhu Family due to their faint bloodline.

In the twenty years that passed, the only person who could barely be called a member of the Zhu Family was Zhu Ying!

The only reason he managed to survive peacefully all those years was because of the Liu Clan’s assistance!

“What’s that in your hand?” Sun Haiwei’s voice rang in his ear.

“Huh? Did you already deal with the poison?” Shang Xia tossed the plaque over to her as he spoke. He saw her pale face and couldn’t help but worry. “Why do you look so bad?” 

Looking at the plaque in her hands, she explained helplessly, “The poison isn't the problem. My internal injuries are more serious than I thought. I’m afraid that I’ll have to remain in seclusion for some time to recover.

“Here?” Shang Xia looked around and continued, “Alright. I’ll open up a place for you to enter seclusion…” 

Sun Haiwei didn’t respond immediately. When Shang Xia turned to look at her, he saw her frowning at the plaque in her hands.

“Is this… Is this the Vermillion Plaque?” Sun Haiwei wasn’t as knowledgeable as Shang Xia on these matters. She could only read through the history and records in the institution once in a while, unlike Shang Xia.

“Yeah. It’s probably it. Looks like our luck isn’t too bad…” Shang Xia chuckled.

It was already a blessing that they managed to kill a rank three undead corpse as two cultivators at the Martial Extremity Realm. 

The number of treasures on the rank three undead corpse was pitiful. The gains of killing it were far from killing a rank three rare beast! 

Sun Haiwei tossed the plaque back to Shang Xia and muttered, “The number of people who managed to obtain a Vermillion Plaque in the Zhu Family is extremely few in number. It’s said that anyone with the Vermillion Plaque had the ability to enter the Zhu Family Manor as they pleased. They could also browse the inheritance of the family and enter the forbidden regions whenever they liked… I wonder how true it is…” 

Shang Xia laughed in response, “Would you like to take a look?” 

Sun Haiwei snapped at him immediately. “Do you think I’m in any state to go looking for treasures right now? Moreover, we only have a single Vermillion Plaque! Even if the rumors are true, only one person will be allowed to enter the inheritance of the Zhu Family!” 

In the battle that passed, it was an undeniable fact that Sun Haiwei had it the worst. She was targeted by the rank three undead corpse and she fought it head-on.

Shang Xia attacked it from the side and even though he expanded a lot of inner qi, it was mostly recovered already.

Sun Haiwei glanced at Shang Xia from the corner of her eye and muttered, “I’ll remind you again… There are countless dangers in the Coral Forest. Even a deputy patriarch of our Tongyou Institution is trapped there. The members of the Rose Party are probably hiding somewhere inside too. Even up till now, the Martial Extermination Realm cultivators on our Tongyou Peak remained completely quiet… Don’t you think that there’s something weird about all this?” 

Shang Xia guessed. “Senior sister, do you think that Deputy Patriarch Ji and the others will come?” 

“They might already be here! After all, none of us will be able to keep track of their movements. Since Deputy Patriarch Liu is trapped, they can’t possibly leave him to die!”  Sun Haiwei struggled to get to her feet. It was obvious how frail she was at that moment. “The best thing we can do is to hand this plaque over to Deputy Patriarch Shang. In fact, any other Martial Extermination Realm expert will do. We can do that after we’re done here. Now, we need to activate the location formation in this mine. When that happens, we’ll be able to lock down this location and the essence qi stone mine will belong to our Tongyou Peak!” 

That was their original mission anyway.

Shang Xia walked around the cavern and looked for the location where the heaven and earth qi was the densest before carving out a cultivation cave in the wall beside him. No matter what, she had to recover before they could complete their mission.

When she entered seclusion, Shang Xia looked for a massive piece of rock to carve out a stone door for her cultivation cave. 

After he was done, he seemed to have realized that he had forgotten something.

Rushing out of the cavern, Shang Xia whistled loudly into the air. Despite waiting a long time, he failed to receive a reply from the Lightning Bird.