An invasion from the Abyss? I, a demonic cultivator, laughed.

Chapter 361 Aura of the Abyss
"This is!"

Chu Xiu's face showed surprise and doubt as he stared intently into the cave. The chilling feeling vanished in an instant, like a wisp of smoke drifting in from afar.

But this still made Chu Xiu frown deeply. He was certain that what he had just felt was not an illusion. If there really was something here that could access the secrets of the abyss, then he would be willing to abandon his own civilization.

After all, for Chu Xiu, his own cultivation level is always the most important thing.

"A strange realm, corpses that have risen from the dead, and an aura exactly like the abyss."

"What exactly is going on with this place?"

Even if Chu Xiu were slow to realize, he could now see that the world was definitely not as simple as he thought.

He suddenly realized something.

Theoretically speaking, only a world where civilization has completely perished could be swallowed by the abyss.

There is only one exception: if a civilization is completely isolated and has no contact with the outside world, like humans in a paradise, then the abyss can ignore their influence and devour them.

From this perspective, it means that after the Ghost King exterminated all the Ghost Exorcists, some kind of change occurred, causing the bottom of the Hundred Ghosts Furnace to be completely isolated, which led to this world being swallowed by the abyss.

Otherwise, it would just be an ordinary transition of civilization, nothing more than a change from the civilization of exorcists to the civilization of ghosts.

Then, thinking of that sacred mountain, towering 100,000 meters high, and the spatial vortex at its summit leading to another world, and the boundless death energy surging from that vortex...
"This place definitely holds many secrets," Chu Xiu thought to himself.

Sensing an aura similar to that of the abyss made him take the mission much more seriously.

As he was pondering silently, a ghostly creature, eight meters tall, wearing heavy armor, with two horns on its head, resembling the bull's head from the mythical beast Ox-Head and Horse-Face, strode over.

"I am Hei Yunzi, responsible for guarding the Carrion-Eating Cave. Are you here to carry out a mission, fellow Daoist?"

The ghost stepped forward and bowed.

Chu Xiu glanced at it. This ghost was quite powerful, possessing strength comparable to a heroic spirit. There were also nine other ghosts in the distance, each with a solidified soul.

If we use the Holy Mountain as a benchmark, Hei Yunzi could probably climb one-third of it on his own. With the help of a suitable magical artifact, it wouldn't be surprising if he could climb two-thirds. The remaining people could barely get close to the level of the Holy Mountain.

"Are you here on a mission too?" Chu Xiu asked after returning the greeting.

“No, we are the deacons of the celestial palace responsible for guarding the secret cave,” said the bull-headed demon. “Scavengers often rush out of this place in groups. If they are allowed to run outside, they may disrupt the order of this world.”

The bull-headed demon chuckled and said, "In that cave, the strength of these monsters will increase many times over. We don't have the guts to enter rashly."

"Fellow Daoist, you must be careful on your journey. Although the Immortal Palace offers generous rewards, we cultivators must prioritize our lives in order to achieve the Great Dao."

Chu Xiu nodded, clasped his hands in thanks, and said, "Thank you, fellow Daoist. I will be careful."

The ghosts here are all very kind, and Chu Xiu has become much more polite.

Without saying anything more, he walked towards the secret cave.

As soon as he reached the entrance, he felt a dense aura of death emanating from it, which surprised him. This aura of death was exactly the same as the one that had fallen from the [Penglai Wonderland]. Not far from the cave entrance, five ghostly figures sat cross-legged, refining the aura of death to cultivate.

Upon seeing him approach, the five ghosts all stood up to exchange pleasantries, displaying impeccable manners.

Chu Xiu cupped his hands in greeting and then stepped into the secret cave.

The light behind me grew dimmer and dimmer, gradually turning into a tiny dot of light, and finally disappeared completely.

In an instant, it was as if we had entered another completely dark world. Human voices and animal sounds were cut off, leaving only the cold air and the rustling sound of poisonous insects crawling. In the darkness, it seemed as if some kind of creature was lurking and spying.

If an ordinary person were here, they would probably be so frightened that they would collapse to the ground. However, with Chu Xiu's current strength, he does not rely on his eyes to see. With a wave of his divine sense, the surrounding situation appeared clearly and accurately in his mind.

This was an extremely wide cave, over fifty meters high and bottomless, with numerous branch paths on both sides, leading to unknown destinations. Though called a cave, Chu Xiu felt it was more like a kingdom of giants, with its intricate and complex network of paths.

Chu Xiu glanced at the map in his hand, made a quick comparison, and was shocked to find that the cave was incredibly large. He had already gone in for more than five miles, but even on the map, he had only traveled less than one percent of the distance. And the unknown parts on the map were even more unknown.

"Looks like making money isn't so easy after all."

Chu Xiu gave a light "heh," not caring at all, and summoned Garuda, which rushed straight to the deepest part of the cave at an extremely fast speed.

He made no attempt to conceal himself, immediately causing a huge commotion. Wherever Garuda passed, it was as if a massive storm was unleashed to both sides, and the surrounding rocks trembled.

Suddenly, Chu Xiu's expression shifted, and a cold smile appeared on his lips.

"Coming so soon?"

Within his consciousness, six incredibly fast figures were rapidly approaching him!
In less than a breath, an extremely ferocious creature appeared before him!

With sharp teeth and long, slender limbs, and grayish-white skin, it climbed onto the nearby stone wall, using all four limbs to leap and bound with extreme agility!

Before he even got close, Chu Xiu smelled an indescribable stench, as if a corpse had been sealed in a secret room in the middle of summer and had been rotting and stinking for more than ten days!
Chu Xiu frowned slightly. Before it could get close, he pointed into the air, and several demonic spears condensed beside him, shooting towards the monster!

Chu Xiu's demonic energy condensed into weapons at this moment was incredibly powerful, even heroic spirits would find it difficult to withstand. Although the monster was extremely fast, after dodging the first spear, it was pierced by the subsequent spears and heavily nailed to the stone wall.

The monster was severely injured and unable to move, but it still bared its teeth and roared at Chu Xiu. With another thought, Chu Xiu unleashed his demonic energy, instantly tearing the monster apart.

Instantly, an astonishing stench filled the air.

"Is this what a scavenger is?"

Chu Xiu's gaze narrowed slightly. This creature was only at the King level, but in this carrion-eating cave, the death energy seemed to have undergone some kind of mutation, turning into a strange power of extreme corruption.

Chu Xiu could sense that the death aura near the Holy Mountain would only turn people into living dead, but the mutated death aura here would cause people to rot and decay, starting from the skin, then the flesh, and gradually rotting until only bones remained!
These carrion eaters were able to absorb this putrid death energy into their bodies. This mutated death energy caused the carrion eaters' bodies to decay, but just like ghosts using death energy to cultivate the Reverse Yin and Yang Technique, this mutated death energy was strengthening their bodies while it was corrupting their flesh and blood.

Over time, these scavengers accumulate a large amount of compressed, mutated death energy within their bodies, which explodes upon death.

"No wonder those ghosts all turned pale when they mentioned this place. These guys are indeed difficult to deal with if they don't have powerful ranged attack methods."

However, this was nothing to Chu Xiu. With a thought, he easily killed the other five carrion-eating ghosts.

"Eighteen taels of Yin Stone in hand."

This was a considerable sum of money, and the fact that it was obtained so easily brought a smile to Chu Xiu's face.

To his even greater surprise, killing these carrion ghosts could actually yield experience points and karma points!
Although they were only a third the size of ordinary abyssal creatures, they were still king-level beings, averaging over a thousand causal points each. This discovery immediately made Chu Xiu much more focused.

Unfortunately, the carrion cave was too large. Even though he made no attempt to hide it and deliberately created quite a commotion, it took him half an hour to attract four more carrion eaters.

However, Chu Xiu didn't care.

According to the ghosts of that celestial palace, the rewards for completing the map are greater than those for killing carrion eaters!
"The ten lords in the Celestial Palace are very concerned about the four extremely dangerous places. Not only are the rewards for the tasks they issue extremely generous, but they also often go there to explore in person, as if there are some treasures hidden inside."

"Of course, the immortals have great love in their hearts and are certainly not acting for their own selfish reasons. I guess they want to destroy the root of the extremely dangerous place and restore peace to this world."

These are the exact words that the ghost from the celestial palace said to Chu Xiu.

What was said in jest was taken seriously by the listener. Chu Xiu didn't believe that those powerful ghosts would actually have such good intentions.

Even if all the ghosts that were born later were truly kind and benevolent, the first batch of ghosts must have included some extremely vicious ones, after all, they were the culprits who destroyed a civilization.

Chu Xiu was also curious about why they were paying attention to this place.

Of course, even if Chu Xiu is being petty, it doesn't matter, since there's still the guaranteed reward for drawing the map.

He stopped thinking about it and focused on recording the surrounding terrain onto the map.

He completed the task at an unbelievable speed. Before him, which ghost possessed such divine speed as Garuda? And which ghost could extend its divine sense to a radius of ten miles like him?
In just half a day, the map was expanded by a large area.

However, Chu Xiu had not yet reached the end of this secret cave. Although the numerous branches in this place had caused him to backtrack quite a bit, the sheer size of this secret cave was still astonishing.

Moreover, he had only randomly chosen a path to follow. This secret cave was interconnected, and there were probably no fewer than a hundred paths as deep as Chu Xiu's.

Chu Xiu wasn't discouraged. The larger the secret cave, the greater the reward he would receive upon completion, and the greater the chance of finding valuable items within.

Therefore, Chu Xiu only rested briefly before continuing along the road.

Two or three more hours passed before he finally reached the end of the road.

"It wasn't easy," Chu Xiu sighed, looking down at the map in his hand. The path he had traveled resembled a winding, slender snake.

Along the way, they also killed more than ten carrion eaters.

If this can continue, I'm afraid we'll soon be able to gather all the resources needed to refine the [Myriad Impurities Return to Origin Bag].

However, just as Chu Xiu was quite pleased and preparing to continue exploring along the nearest fork in the road, his expression suddenly changed, and he looked at the stone wall on his left.

His gaze seemed to pierce through the stone wall, seeing the situation hundreds of meters away.

Suddenly, a phantom figure burst through the stone wall without warning and rushed toward him!
The moment the illusory figure approached, Chu Xiu felt a wave of dizziness.

Psychic attack!

Chu Xiu had been on guard against mental attacks ever since he entered the abyss, but this was the first time he had encountered one!
However, he reacted quickly and remained calm in the face of the change. He swung out the Chiwen sword in his hand, and in an instant, the violent sword energy tore the phantom's body to shreds.

[Slaying a creature grants +21 experience points]

[Item Obtained: 3472 Causality Points]

"This must be the dead soul."

Looking at the scattered souls before him, Chu Xiu waved his hand and absorbed them all into the Soul Banner, leaving only a special crystal as evidence.

No wonder this creature is much more expensive than a scavenger; it is indeed extremely dangerous.

If the carrion eaters corrode the flesh, then the dead souls corrode the soul!

This dead soul was only at the King level. With Chu Xiu's current cultivation of the Yama Sutra, he could easily handle not only King-level attacks but also Heroic Spirit-level mental attacks.

With his numerous protective gear, even a demigod with mental abilities wouldn't be able to kill him instantly!

Logically speaking, a King-level mental attack should be no different from a tickle, but this dead soul was able to break through his heavy armor defenses and make him dizzy, which shows how amazing it is.

Ordinary ghosts would be instantly killed if they saw it. Coupled with its super strong ability to hide until Chu Xiu discovered it was a thousand meters away, even heroic spirits and ghosts might suffer a great loss if they were not careful!
"No wonder that after so many years, the exploration of this Carrion Cave has only progressed so little. It seems that even those immortals dare not go too deep."

However, while they were afraid, Chu Xiu was fearless and immediately continued to fly rapidly around them, drawing maps.

If he weren't unsure about the cause of the mutated death energy in this place, he would have liked to release his ghost to explore it together.

Then a question suddenly occurred to him: could his ghost army cultivate the [Reversal of Yin and Yang Technique]?
If possible, his ghost army would likely grow at an extremely terrifying rate!

The presence of so many high-level ghosts near Youcheng is not only due to the dense Yin energy at the bottom of the Hundred Ghost Furnace, but also largely thanks to the [Reversal of Yin and Yang Technique], which transforms death energy to strengthen the soul body much faster than simply absorbing Yin energy.

"Let's go back and try it out."

Having made up his mind, Chu Xiu stopped thinking about it and continued his exploration.

He was engrossed in his task, and two more days passed in the blink of an eye.

In the past two days, he has killed more than forty carrion eaters and five more dead souls.

The progress of map drawing has also increased significantly.

However, the secret cave was so large that Chu Xiu couldn't say how much he had already explored.

Furthermore, because he had to remain isolated from the high concentration of death energy, his magical power had already been depleted by more than half. Given Chu Xiu's cautious nature, he decided to temporarily leave the cave, use the tools to recover his condition, and then continue exploring.

However, just as he was returning and almost reached the cave entrance, his brow suddenly twitched, and a feeling that made his heart palpitate surged into his heart without warning!
Before he could react, a chilling feeling, just like that of the abyss, enveloped him!
However, just like at the cave entrance, the feeling came and went quickly. He was only stunned for a moment before the feeling vanished without a trace.

Chu Xiu looked at a dark passage and frowned slightly.

His intuition vaguely sensed that the abyss-like chill was coming from the depths of that passage!

However, Chu Xiu didn't know whether he should trust his intuition, since the feeling was too vague and might even be just wishful thinking.

Besides, he's not in very good shape right now.

However, Chu Xiu hesitated only slightly before manipulating Garuda to turn around and rush into the passage at high speed!
(End of this chapter)