Netherworld Painted Skin Scroll

Chapter 396 Unique Magic Weapon

When Li Wuxiang saw this thing, he had already carried Zhao Qi up from the bottom of the cliff, using the vegetation as cover. Only Zhao Qi's head was showing, which was very similar to the situation when he and Xue Baoping stared at each other in the ditch.

Just two or three steps away from the clay sculpture, you can see scattered scraps of unburnt paper money, ashes not yet blown away by the mountain wind, incense sticks stuck in the ground, and wrinkled fruit next to the stone pier, indicating that quite a few people have come here to offer sacrifices.

Beside them were two shallow vats, like those used by wealthy families to grow water lilies in their courtyards. One vat contained clear water with a layer of yellow mud at the bottom. The other vat was filled with well-stirred, sticky, wet mud.

The valley was empty and quiet. It was midday, and summer, so no one was working. Li Wuxiang stared at the clay sculpture for a while, then said to Zhao Qi, "Listen, calm down and listen."

Zhao Qi did as he was told. At first, he could only hear his own breathing, Li Wuxiang's breathing... Li Wuxiang's breathing!?

"Huh? You're alive!?"

"No. I was just breathing for fun. I'm not telling you to listen to me, you listen to it."

Zhao Qi focused his attention on the clay sculpture. Then he heard it—not breathing, but a very faint crackling sound, as if the dried clay on the surface was slowly splitting open with tiny cracks. The sound had no rhythm, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, just like…

"There's something moving inside..."

Li Wuxiang suddenly pressed his head down, and the two of them retreated back into the bushes below the cliff.

Just as Zhao Qi was about to ask him what he wanted, he heard footsteps. They approached from afar and stopped at the edge of the cliff.

The newcomer was dressed very elegantly, in a brand-new, moon-white Taoist robe, the fabric crisp and almost wrinkle-free. A leather belt, made of brass and inlaid with seven black jade beads, was tied around his waist. He held a whisk in his hand, which rested on his left arm. Facing the cliff and looking at the mountains, a slight smile played on his lips, his expression showing a mixture of self-satisfaction and delight.

It was Zhao Qi!

The two people were looking at him from below, which made Zhao Qi appear especially graceful and dashing. It was no exaggeration for the people of Gaiyuan Town to call him a "god."

Zhao Qi stood beside the clay sculpture, gazing into the mountains for a moment, before suddenly speaking, "Looking at me now, what are you thinking?"

Just as Zhao Qi was about to move, Li Wuxiang pressed him down again.

Zhao Qi then said, "We were master and disciple, and no matter what you think, I still cherish the bond we formed back then."

"I went to Jinshui to find you to collect your body. At that time, I still wanted to fulfill my duty as a disciple. Unfortunately, you didn't fulfill your duty as a master. You left and didn't care about the mountain. You even tried to take over my body. Zhao Kui, how have you been these past few days?"

No one spoke to him. Zhao Qi turned around, squatted down, and put his ear close to the clay sculpture to listen.

At this moment, Li Wuxiang raised his hand and inserted it into the crevice of the rock wall. Zhao Qi saw his hand become thinner, and many vine-like things quickly seeped into the soil along the crevice—this scene reminded him of what he had seen in the Myriad Transformations Cube, those pale white mycelia attached to the dragon corpse.

Li Wuxiang's other hand was still holding him. As he thought of this, he actually heard Zhao Kui's voice. It was very small and muffled, more like a tiny vibration similar to speaking than a voice, and it came from Li Wuxiang's hand into his head: "...I've taught you everything."

"Did you teach me, or did you teach me everything?" Zhao Qi said. "Something feels off. You said you were hiding in the mountains of Jinshui to cultivate Taiyi, but I couldn't find the cave you mentioned. You said you were cultivating Taiyi with over a hundred children, so where have you kept them all these years? Raising them in the mountains? What have you been feeding them?"

After a while, Zhao Kui said, "Guang Chanzi has already been passed on to you, why are you bothered by these things?"

Zhao Qi shifted his body slightly, twirled the whisk in his hand, and plunged the handle into the clay sculpture. Li Wuxiang heard a muffled groan from the Zhao puppet inside; it must have been in pain.

Zhao Qi interrupted several times before finally saying, "Why bother with these things? You didn't teach me like this before. You were very strict with me. Why did you bother with these things back then? Does it hurt? Does it hurt as much as when you used to hit me?"

"...It doesn't hurt," Zhao Kui said.

Anger flashed across Zhao Qi's face, but he laughed the next moment: "Alright, you've mastered the Guang Chan Zi technique, so of course it doesn't hurt much anymore. But I know what's making you suffer—I'll mold you right here, outside my cave. So many people come and go to worship you every day; if you can move and shout a few times, you might be able to escape."

"It's a pity you can't cry out or move. The incense and prayers you receive are barely enough to keep you alive—you're just separated from the vast world outside by a thin shell. Aren't you suffering? Haven't you had enough? Let me tell you, Zhao Kui, the sooner you spill everything, the sooner you'll be free! Once my cave entrance is fixed, guess how I'll settle you?"

As Zhao Qi finished speaking, he walked to a shallow vat beside him, grabbed a handful of wet mud, and slowly filled the hole he had just made with the whisk. He also filled in the cracks around it. "At that time," he said, "I will sculpt a golden statue of you inside the gate and imprison you there. The Tianxin Sect imprisoned their sect leader in a clay statue, and our Ranshan Sect is doing the same. Isn't that interesting?"

Zhao Kui stopped speaking, and Zhao Qi washed his hands in the shallow tub beside him, then stood up again: "I have three more days of patience—"

After saying this, he seemed to suddenly see something and immediately rushed towards the distant cave entrance. Li Wuxiang and Zhao Qi then reappeared to see what was happening and saw a girl running out of the cave entrance, which was covered by bamboo scaffolding.

She saw Zhao Qi and seemed to panic for a moment, unsure whether to continue running out or retreat. After hesitating for a moment, she chose the former, but Zhao Qi had already arrived. He kicked her, sending her flying back into the cave, and then he followed closely behind, grabbing the girl's hair and dragging her deeper into the cave.

Zhao Qi was stunned, but Li Wuxiang raised his hand and drew a few strokes in the air, then slapped the two of them, and suddenly lifted him up to the top of the cliff.

Just as Zhao Qi was about to squat down, Li Wuxiang said, "Don't panic, others can't see us anymore."

Zhao Qi was taken aback, then lowered his voice: "Didn't you say you didn't use supernatural powers?"

“This time is different.” Li Wuxiang walked up to the clay sculpture of Zhao Kui, squatted down, and asked in a low voice, “Are you Zhao Kui?”

He didn't need to put his ear close to Zhao Kui to hear what Zhao Qi was saying, so he quickly put his hand on Li Wuxiang's shoulder, hoping to hear Zhao Kui's voice through him like before, but Li Wuxiang slapped it off.

“…That’s not important, but I, a rogue cultivator, might be able to save your life,” Li Wuxiang said again.

Zhao Qi guessed that Zhao Kui must have just asked who Li Wuxiang was—he really wanted to hear it. He wanted to hear Zhao Kui speak, to hear Zhao Kui who didn't seem to have gone mad at the moment.

The last time he spoke to Zhao Kui like this was over a decade ago, and the Zhao Kui he saw afterward was no longer the same master he had known. Lately, he had felt he had lost all affection for Zhao Kui and for Ranshan. But now, once the thought of "wanting to hear" arose in his heart, it spread like wildfire.

He simply stopped touching Li Wuxiang and instead put his ear to the clay sculpture to listen.

"...The two of you are not enough. If you really want to save me, go to any of the thirty-six sects nearby. Just say that the Ranshan Sect Master, Zhao Kui, has a treasure to offer, and lure them to save my life. I will reward you handsomely afterwards!"

Li Wuxiang nodded: "That's fine. But should I tell you about your affairs? For example, what if you kidnapped more than a hundred children and took them to the Wanhua Fang, isolating them from the world and making them think that their little stone chamber was the whole world, and then starved them to death? Or what if you captured a girl and locked her in the stone chamber above for your pleasure, lying to her that the outside world was a sea of ​​fire—should I tell you about these things?"

After a long while, Zhao Kui finally asked, "Who are you!?"

“I am the one who can save you, but I am also the one who can make you suffer ten times more than you are now.”

"Hehe, you—"

“I also know that your former skills didn’t lie in you, but in the Ranshan Talisman. The successive sect leaders of Ranshan offered talismans before the statue of Donghuang Taiyi in the illusion, and you used those talismans to perform Ranshan Talisman techniques. Without that, the Ranshan Talisman wouldn’t be such a remarkable skill. Zhao Kui, are you still going to laugh at me?”

Zhao Kui's smile vanished: "Who exactly are you? What do you want to ask?"

"I want to ask you how you ended up like this. Did you fail to master Taiyi?"

"...Did my unworthy disciple send you here? Go tell him, Guang Chanzi—"

Li Wuxiang sneered: "What is Guang Chanzi? He's just a Nine Palaces Disintegration Technique taken from the Lesser Calamity Sword Scripture."

He quickly recited the Nine Palaces Disintegration Technique to Zhao Kui: "You, the Ranshan Sect Master, are utterly ignorant. You treat this worthless fragment of Guang Chanzi's writings like a priceless treasure. What do you think of my Nine Palaces Disintegration Technique?" Zhao Kui's expression was unseen, but his voice could be heard. He seemed extremely surprised, even slightly delirious: "This...this...this...wonderful! This is so profound...this is the true Dao...where did you learn this from?!"

Zhao Qi's heart sank slightly, and he suddenly felt a little unwilling to listen anymore—he couldn't say whether it was because he didn't want to listen anymore, or because he couldn't bear to listen anymore. At this moment, Zhao Kui sounded no different from those wandering martial arts cultivators, truly regarding this thing as a treasure, even making him feel a little foolish!

"Tell me what happened first."

Zhao Kui's tone became extremely earnest, even respectful: "Although I don't know which senior expert you are, since you've foreseen my affairs... my life is in your hands, senior. Please listen to me, the truth is actually this—when I was still in Ran Mountain, I dreamed of the Great Emperor Taiyi..."

Many people are the type to deny their actions to the death, and it seems Zhao Kui is one of them. Li Wuxiang listened for a while as he recounted how he received the divine revelation from Donghuang Taiyi, how he gathered the 102 children as Taiyi instructed, and how he developed genuine feelings for Zhao Xi through their daily interactions, before hearing him say, "...It should be complete now. I saw the true spirit of the Great Emperor Taiyi. The Great Emperor's true spirit is incomparably profound, vast, majestic, pure, and radiant. I have invited the Great Emperor's true spirit down..."

The preceding was all nonsense, but upon hearing this, Li Wuxiang's heart skipped a beat. The Taiyi True Spirit—empty, vast, and pale—that was his initial impression. However, for someone like Zhao Kui, who believed in Taiyi, the feeling should be subtly different from his own. He probably wasn't lying; he had truly refined Taiyi, or rather, his actions had attracted Taiyi's attention!
"...Only then did I realize that my cultivation was insufficient to support the Great Emperor's true spirit! I truly regret it; why was I in such a hurry? If I had cultivated for a few more days, reached the Golden Core stage, and had a seed of life within my body, perhaps I could have been possessed by the Great Emperor's true spirit..."

"...That's how my physical body crumbled—"

Li Wuxiang interrupted him: "You have the Golden Entanglement, and you've even refined it into your physical body, yet you say you can't support the True Spirit of Taiyi?"

Zhao Kui seemed taken aback: "...Senior, you even know about this? I'm telling the truth, my physical form is because of this—"

Zhao Qi didn't want to listen anymore. The Zhao Kui before him was not the Zhao Kui he remembered—humble and extremely respectful, revealing a side of him he had never seen before. He took two steps back to look at Li Wuxiang, only to find that Li Wuxiang seemed somewhat lost in thought, as if pondering Zhao Kui's words, "It cannot bear the true spirit of the Great Emperor."

After another five or six breaths, Li Wuxiang stopped talking to Zhao Kui and turned to him, saying, "This time it's correct. Zhao Kui summoned the true spirit in the Wanhua Fang, but his physical body collapsed and all his skills dissipated. He and Zhao Xi came out of the Wanhua Fang—just in time to run into Zhao Qi at the Xue family. He tried to possess Zhao Qi, but failed. Instead, Zhao Qi suppressed him with talismans."

"Next, Zhao Qi captured both of them and came here to conceal his whereabouts, intending to continue cultivating his method of achieving immortality. The people here are not good people; you can make your move now."

Zhao Qi hesitated for a moment: "Shall we ask him again? What if what he said isn't entirely true? He—"

"Did you see the girl that Zhao Qi dragged into the cave just now?"

"Ah."

“That’s Zhao Xi. If Zhao Kui’s physical body hadn’t disintegrated, Zhao Xi wouldn’t have survived. Nothing else matters, as long as she’s alive, what Zhao Kui said is mostly true. He’s kept Zhao Xi around these past few days to interrogate Zhao Kui separately about what kind of magic he used to hide over a hundred children. Go now.”

Zhao Qi took two steps, then turned back: "By myself? This one over here has been repaired by Guang Chanzi..."

"Oh, okay, I'll guard the cave entrance for you." Li Wuxiang said this, and walked with him to the cave entrance, where they stopped.

"Do you have anything I can hold just in case? I..."

"Here." Li Wuxiang handed him the flying sword. "It has my sword energy on it. You can use it as a dart. As long as you hit it accurately, the thing inside won't be able to withstand it."

Zhao Qi took the small sword, glanced at Li Wuxiang a few more times, and felt that something was wrong with him.

After hearing Zhao Kui's words, "It cannot contain the true spirit of the Great Emperor," he became thoughtful and preoccupied, as if his mind was no longer on Zhao Qi.

But he stopped thinking about it, covered his face again, and went inside, clutching Li Wuxiang's small sword.

Li Wuxiang truly had no mind to think about Zhao Qi inside at this moment. He had already accomplished almost everything he wanted to do—Zhao Qi had completely rid himself of his inner demons, and Zhao Kui was no longer a thorn in his side. After collecting Zhao Qi's soul here, he would return to the Myriad Transformations Realm to handle the rest.

Now he has something more to ponder. Zhao Qi was right, it was that phrase, "It cannot contain the true spirit of the Great Emperor."

There's something I've always overlooked.

Back in the depths of the Netherworld Abyss, the True Spirit of Taiyi possessed him, attempting to touch the deeper layers of the Eastern Emperor Seal. The first time was indeed the True Spirit of Taiyi, while the second time was himself, thrown there by Li Ye. As he said, an event that has already occurred is like a room; one can do whatever one wants within it.

The first time was the true spirit, the second time was oneself. If one were to grasp the destiny of humanity like Donghuang Taiyi, there could be a third and a fourth time, and each time something different would descend upon the physical body.

But the problem lies in this first time. Zhao Kui said that if he could form a core and then invite the Taiyi True Spirit to descend to earth, perhaps the physical body could withstand it. But Li Wuxiang had experienced the power of the True Spirit and knew that there was no difference between Qi Refining and Core Formation to the True Spirit. It was just a matter of one being a thinner piece of paper and the other a thicker piece of paper. To a heavy iron ball, they were both equally fragile.

But why was it that when he was in Youjiuyuan for the first time, his body was able to withstand the descent of the true spirit, instead of collapsing like Zhao Kui?

Is it because I am special? Or am I an "empty" entity?
He was not born into this world by chance. That much was certain. Because he had remembered that he had been guided in his previous life, and he could even recall many details about that mottled door.

At this moment, the sounds of fierce fighting came from inside the cave; it seemed that the two Zhao Qi were exchanging blows. Judging from their voices, the better Zhao Qi seemed to have the upper hand, and the one inside the cave was in a very sorry state under his attacks—he had practiced the Guang Chan Zi technique, which required dissipating one's original cultivation. It had been less than a year since he discovered Zhao Kui in Jinshui, and he might not even be as strong as he used to be.

Then the sound suddenly stopped, and Li Wuxiang heard a muffled voice coming from inside the cave: "...What a chivalrous act, daring to bully me... Serving the people... Meddling in other people's business... Do you want to take care of this little girl's life... Get out of here, or I'll..."

He guessed that the one inside the cave had taken Zhao Xi hostage and was threatening her life. The situation was quite interesting—the same two people, now in two extreme, completely different positions.

The voice from inside the cave suddenly stopped a moment later, followed by an exclamation: "You..."

Li Wuxiang guessed that Zhao Qi had ripped off the mask covering his face. Sure enough, what followed was the explosive sound of a flying sword infused with Nascent Soul energy being launched—a wave of air accompanied by dust surged out of the cave, and the scaffolding at the entrance was scattered haphazardly on the ground.

Zhao Qi won. He just hadn't expected the sword strike to be so powerful; he wondered if it had injured Zhao Xi.

Li Wuxiang flipped his hand, and a talisman appeared in his palm. He then reached into the air, and a blurry human figure appeared on the talisman—it was Zhao Qi's soul inside the cave.

Before leaving, he told Zhao Qi to help him test whether the illusion was real or not. When he finally collected the soul, he realized that the illusion was real. Zhao Qi's soul on the talisman looked no different from the soul from which he came. Before he was killed, he really was not a living person!

After three or four breaths, sounds came from inside the cave again. Some were Zhao Qi's, and some were Zhao Xi's. Zhao Xi seemed to have been injured and was sobbing softly.

Li Wuxiang felt relieved, put the talisman in his sleeve, and looked up at the sky.

The sky was clear, the sun high in the sky, without a single cloud. But what he saw was not the sun—instead, something transparent, like the opening of a cave.

It moved with Li Wuxiang's gaze; when he looked at the sky, it erased the sun. When he looked at the cave entrance, it erased it. It was like a treasure unique to him, arising and disappearing with his thoughts.

But Li Wuxiang didn't know what it was. The only thing he was sure of was that it appeared after he saw something, perhaps belonging to the Great Lord Taizhuo, possessing the dragon's body in the Wanhua Fang.

He remembered that he was using the authority of the Great Lord Tai Zhuo to travel to the other side through a passage similar to this thing—he didn't know what was on the other side, but the closer he got, the more authority he could use. Thus, he figured out what the six emperors of the Xuan Sect were and what the spiritual energy in the world was.

And then? He couldn't remember. He remembered that his last thought was to see more, to figure out the truth about the Golden Immortals in this world. But at that time, he also knew that his trend toward "the other side" was completely irreversible, and he even had the thought, "If I hear the Dao in the morning, I can die content in the evening," in his mind.

And then? Then he came back, sober. It was as if he had seen through everything without paying any price, as if his previous premonition of danger was all an illusion.

Moreover, he obtained a treasure that belonged only to him—it was not a weapon, nor could it protect him, but it could make his supernatural powers stronger.

When the starlight of the Great Calamity Star is activated, if one's mind stirs, this thing will also appear in one's divine sense—the starlight shines down through it, its power and authority are dozens of times stronger than before, as if he has already been able to touch the fruition of a true immortal.

The Great Calamity Star was sealed by Li Ye using the authority of Donghuang Taiyi. As a result, he was able to touch a bit of the authority of human destiny again and bring it down again. Once this wisp of authority passed through this thing again, it immediately became extremely powerful, enough to pull himself and Zhao Qi back to the countless present worlds that Li Ye had covered through cause and effect in the past.

But what exactly is this thing?
(End of this chapter)