Netherworld Painted Skin Scroll

Chapter 382 The True Form of the Dragon and Crane
Xu Zhen spread his arms and leaped upwards—when he reached mid-air, his entire body transformed into an extremely long strip, as if a human skin had been stretched. First, he transformed into a snake, then scales grew on his body, and finally, two horns sprouted from his head, almost exactly the same as when Li Wuxiang fought against the descended Blood God.

Upon seeing him like this, Zhao Qi finally realized what was happening and exclaimed, "I knew it... no wonder! Li Wuxiang looked exactly like that just now... he looked like he had transformed into a dragon!"

However, the dragon Xu Zhen transformed into was different from the one Li Wuxiang had before. The dragon he had transformed into then only had a single horn on its head, while the dragon Xu Zhen transformed into now had two coral-like horns on its head. The dragon circled briefly in mid-air, then immediately swam up into the sky and circled three more times.

The once clear blue sky suddenly became misty, the mist gathering into white clouds, which then turned into heavy, dark clouds. In just a few breaths, thick clouds gathered overhead, lightning flashed, and Xu Zhen's scales appeared and disappeared among the clouds. His voice boomed in the high sky like thunder: "What you said is true—the fate of heaven and earth cannot be changed, destiny cannot be altered!"

"Li Wuxiang, do you know? You said that your Myriad Transformations Formation was the former training ground of the True Lord of the Wei River, and this has become a self-fulfilling prophecy! This very place is indeed my former training ground!"

"However, my dojo isn't what you described, hahahaha!" Xu Zhen circled the clouds again. "I can only remember a little... so I'll just show you a little... to broaden your horizons first! After I collect the dragon bones from your body, I'll broaden your horizons even further... hahahaha!"

As soon as he finished speaking, the scene in the Myriad Transformations Square suddenly changed. The sky turned black, not because the dark clouds gathered overhead, but because the entire sky became pitch black, as if it had gone from day to night.

The light at night should be extremely dim, but it wasn't under this black sky. Because above, and all around, there was something else—

High in the sky, there was a colossal object. When Li Wuxiang looked up, he knew that it must be extremely far away, perhaps tens of thousands of miles away. Because there were still some points of reference in this dark sky: a few extremely sparse stars.

However, those stars weren't just points of light; their outlines were still visible—one was a dull red, about the size of a peanut. Its dark red surface had many blackened patches, like an iron ball heated to a red-hot state; those dark patches were traces of oxidation caused by the high temperature.

There was another one, blue and about the size of a soybean. It looked like the moon, with large shadows on it, only this moon was a bright blue.

The third one is the most like a normal star. It is about the size of a sesame seed, incandescent, but not dazzling or blinding; it is just like a point of light emitting a soft white glow.

The enormous thing was located between the red and blue stars. It was a skeleton, and it looked like a dragon's skeleton. The red star was the size of a peanut, the blue star was the size of a soybean, and the dragon's skeleton, from this perspective, was a full hand's size... I wonder just how terrifying its size would be if we got close enough to it!

The dragon forms that Li Wuxiang previously transformed into and Xu Zhen are currently in are merely resemblances. The dragon that Li Wuxiang transformed from the body of a xiezhi has only a single horn on its forehead. The dragon that Xu Zhen has now transformed from a skin has a shorter, rounder muzzle, and actually looks more like a fish head with a beast's nose.

However, the dragon head in the sky was exactly the same as the dragon in Li Wuxiang's memory, and even looked more "standard" than the Ninth Prince in Ling Mountain.

It had pale golden horns covered in wounds and cracks, and fine, sharp teeth, though many were missing. Reflected by the red and blue stars, it shone with a purple light, which also illuminated its empty eye sockets. But when Li Wuxiang saw these eye sockets, he felt that they were not entirely lifeless, but rather still possessed some vitality.

Two stars revolved in the silent, boundless dark sky. Because of the dim spots on their surfaces, the purple light reflected in their eye sockets flickered. As a result, Li Wuxiang had a strange feeling—that these things were looking at him and his tiny existence on the ground and in the clouds.

Its body, except for its head, was twisted—twisted, not coiled. It had four claws, each incomplete, missing a part. One front claw was folded together, another was open, and the two hind claws were curled upwards.

Li Wuxiang could imagine that before this enormous dragon died, it must have gone through an extremely painful period. At that time, its massive body must have been rolling and writhing, fighting against some powerful force or enemy, or perhaps its body convulsed due to extreme pain, eventually settling into this shape and losing its life.

The three people around him were stunned by what they saw above them, almost forgetting to breathe.

So Li Wuxiang looked around again.

The enormous carcass wasn't just the one at the top of the sky—there was another, slightly smaller one in the eastern part of the heavens. This one also looked like a dragon, but its snout was slightly longer than the one at the top, yet shorter than that of a crocodile. Another difference was that this carcass had wings. One of its wing bones was also missing, the missing bone fragments turning into tiny pieces, drifting silently near the dragon's body like slightly larger specks of dust.

This giant dragon with wings on its back must have had its wings bitten or grabbed by an enemy before it was killed, and then it thrashed about wildly. As a result, the bones left in its corpse were almost all scattered. It seems that because there was no other force disturbing it, it still floated, barely maintaining its original shape.

There are also skeletons in the West. But the Western skeletons are not dragons, but seem to be a giant bird. Perhaps a crane or something else—because the beak is very long and the leg bones are even longer. The dragon with wings on its back was almost completely scattered, while the skeleton of this giant bird, except for the beak and slender leg bones, was almost completely shattered, turning into a cloud of white debris floating in the dark night sky.

Li Wuxiang imagined its life again—being bitten or grabbed by something, then chewed or kneaded violently, almost crushing its entire body.

And in the South...

There were similar things in the south. But Li Wuxiang wasn't sure if what he found there was a corpse. Because what it looked like was a mountain… a broken jade mountain. The almost translucent white jade mountain was shattered into three large pieces, with countless tiny fragments hidden in the cracks, but he couldn't see any more details. Because the jade mountain was surrounded by clouds and mist—there were only three stars here, one red, one blue, and one white, but the clouds surrounding the jade mountain displayed a seven-colored glow, as if they didn't belong here, as if the light shone from elsewhere, or as if it was originally this color.

By the time he saw this, his eyes had gradually adjusted to the darkness of the ceiling. He then noticed something else, faintly visible in the darkness.

So Li Wuxiang turned his head slightly and looked at it out of the corner of his eye.

Then he saw, or rather, sensed. There was something else in the darkness, something he couldn't quite describe. Those things were scattered, fragmented, formless, and even difficult to describe with a precise concept; they were very much like… very much like… the “Great Lord of Tai Zhuo” whom he had previously cultivated to the Nascent Soul stage in the heavens, attracted the Heavenly Tribulation, and was then repelled by it.

The Great Lord Taizhuo back then was vibrant and terrifying, but this thing in the darkness was more like a heavy, deathly aura.

A feeling arose in Li Wuxiang's heart: this was the Great Lord Taizhuo, or someone of the same kind, only like those enormous corpses in the sky, no longer in a state of "life"—but not "dead" either. No… there was something else. Within that heavy aura of death, there seemed to be some faint glimmers. So faint that Li Wuxiang wasn't sure if it was his imagination, like tiny specks of dust drifting in the darkness.

He, Xue Baoping, Li Guichen, and Zhao Qi were all shocked by this scene and remained silent for a moment.

Xu Zhen, who was above the sky and in the dark clouds, also stopped speaking. It seemed that even he had not expected the original Wanhua Fangli to be like this.

What can change is not only the sky, but also the surroundings—the boundaries of Wanhuafang were originally shimmering mist, like a person looking out over a plain in the middle of a gloomy, rainy day, seeing nothing tangible at the end of their vision, only a grayish light.

But now the boundaries have vanished, even something describable has disappeared. When looking into the distance, sight fails, and the mind's consciousness provides the feedback—endless, nothingness, chaos. It's as if everything is there, yet nothing is there at all.

Li Wuxiang withdrew his gaze, realizing that what he was seeing or feeling was exactly what Tong Xu had been wanting to see.

"What is this?" Zhao Qi asked cautiously. His voice was almost a whisper, barely audible to the three people around him. "Is it... you know?"

His tone became even more timid, as if he were afraid of waking those things in the heavens: "Donghuang Taiyi and the others? Or did they die in Mount Ling... Bah, don't blame me... those True Immortals and Golden Immortals who have vanished?"

“No,” Li Wuxiang said.

Zhao Qi stopped arguing at this point: "Why? How did you know?"

Li Wuxiang shook his head: "I have seen the Netherworld Mother. She is different from this one."

When he first went to the Netherworld Abyss, he saw the remains of the Netherworld Mother. It looked like a corpse, but he could clearly feel that the thing "still retained its divinity"—the appearance of a "corpse" seemed to only mean that the Netherworld Mother was in a state of "dormancy," which was only manifested in the form of a corpse to humans.

In fact, the remnants of the Netherworld Mother's body still possessed powerful vitality and might, something he could immediately sense.

But now, in his perception, these things in the sky, while not "dead," were extremely decayed and could no longer be considered alive. It was as if all concepts of "return," "reorganization," and "restoration" had been extinguished, and they had become a state of pure annihilation and stagnation.

"Xu Zhen!" Li Wuxiang suddenly shouted, startling the three people beside him. Zhao Qi quickly pulled him aside, saying, "Shh—"

Li Wuxiang slapped his hand away and looked up at the thick clouds in the sky—where lightning had flashed before, but now it had dissipated. Xu Zhen's dragon scales were no longer visible in the clouds, and Li Wuxiang could imagine him floating above the sea of ​​clouds, also staring blankly at the sky.

"You said this is your dojo? Now do you remember? To me, this looks more like a graveyard. What, did your true form crawl out of a graveyard?"

Silence reigned in the sky. After a long while, the thick clouds were suddenly stirred again, and a dragon's head emerged from the clouds. Xu Zhen's eyes, like copper bells, shone brightly. Although he was in beast form, his open mouth revealed a sinister grin—

"The heavens are my true form! I didn't remember, but now I understand! Didn't you say I came from beyond the heavens on a star raft?! The heavens are my heavens! Just like the wondrous realm of the Six Great Emperors of the Mysterious Sect, the heavens must be my wondrous realm! That one in the heavens is my true form... Yes, yes! What came here was merely a true spirit! What star raft? That was my true spirit descending to earth! It's just that there were no Golden Immortals or True Immortals back then, and you people of the Central Continent didn't understand what a true spirit was!"

After saying this, he shrank his head and flicked his tail, instantly dispersing the thick clouds in the sky, and sped away towards the high heavens!

Li Wuxiang only wanted to trick him to see if he knew what this place was, but now he realized that the answer was that Xu Zhen didn't know either.

But since he can transform the Myriad Transformations Formation into this form, it is undoubtedly the reincarnation of the true spirit of the True Lord of the Wei River!

Then he absolutely must not be allowed to come into contact with those enormous corpses in the sky—those things currently only evoke a sense of "annihilation" in his mind, like a pool of stagnant, oily water. He doesn't know if Xu Zhenzhen touching those things would be like a spark igniting them instantly!

As the nine sword lights behind him unfurled, one remained suspended above his head while the other eight scattered to his sides, he soared into the sky, chasing after Xu Zhen!

Zhao Qi looked around at Xue Baoping and Li Guichen—seeing that Xue Baoping was still in a daze and Li Guichen was just standing still, he realized that neither of them had the ability to fly on land.

He gritted his teeth, stamped his foot, and shouted loudly, "Li Wuxiang, I'm here to help you!"

It immediately transformed into a streak of blood-red light and flew up after Li Wuxiang.

Only Xue Baoping and Li Guichen remained standing on the ground. Li Guichen thought for a moment, frowned, and sighed, "There's nothing we can do now. Let's dig a hole. Dig it deep, and you and this little girl can hide inside. If they start fighting, something might fall from the sky... well, better than nothing."

Xue Baoping didn't move, just staring blankly at the sky. Li Guichen initially thought she was frightened and was about to comfort her again when he noticed that her expression was very strange.

She stared at the dragon corpse in the center of the sky, which Xu Zhen was running towards. There was no fear in her eyes, but rather a bright light in them, which looked more like... joy!
(End of this chapter)