Primordial Era: The Three Senior Brothers of the Taiqing Clan

Chen Qing stood inside the bronze door, his blood seemingly freezing in that instant.

When the Demon Lord's words reached his ears, he felt his heart leap heavily in his chest, and then the whole world fell silent, leaving only the faint hum of the dark red crystals in the underground hall.

"What did you say?" Chen Qing's voice was very soft, so soft that it was almost drowned out by the humming of the crystal.

The Demon Lord stood before the enormous stone platform, the hem of his black robe trailing to the ground, making him resemble a black statue worn smooth by the passage of time.

He looked at Chen Qing, his gaze calm to the point of being indifferent, as if recounting an old story unrelated to himself: "You heard it. The one who sealed it in back then was me."

The Zhuxian Sword in Tongtian's hand trembled slightly. He did not draw the sword, but a trace of sword intent seeped out from the gap in the scabbard, like a spring compressed to its limit, ready to be released.

His gaze was fixed sharply on the Demon Lord, like a beast assessing whether its prey had any hidden tricks up its sleeve.

"When?" Chen Qing took a step forward, his shoes striking the stone slabs of the hall with a crisp echo. "Before or after Pangu created the world?"

"After that." The Demon Lord turned around, his back to them, and walked towards the stone platform. He had already put away the animal hide on the platform, revealing the smooth, mirror-like black surface underneath. Several faint lines appeared on the surface, exactly like the outline of the array diagram on the animal hide.

The Demon Lord's fingers gently traced the patterns on the table, as if caressing an old object lost for too long. "After Pangu separated heaven and earth, he suppressed the main body of 'Shi' in the Ruins of Return, but the severed limbs of 'Shi' were scattered in different locations. The largest piece fell into the Demon God Realm, which was then a mass of chaotic viscous fluid."

He paused, then turned around.

"Back then, the Demon God Realm wasn't called the Demon God Realm. There was no sky, no earth, only a semi-solidified primordial substance suspended in chaos."

After the limb fell in, it began to slowly seep and spread outwards, like ink dripping into clear water, staining the entire area with its scent. I happened to be traveling in that area and noticed something amiss, so I gave chase.

As the Demon Lord spoke, a faint smile appeared at the corner of his mouth, like a bitter laugh, or perhaps a self-mockery hidden deep within the depths of time: "I thought I could handle it. I spent nearly a hundred years using all the materials I could find at the time—including fragments of my own Dao foundation—to construct a nine-layered seal deep within the earth, pressing that piece of limb firmly to the bottom layer."

Then, after about a thousand years, the entire ley lines of the Demon God Realm were reorganized, allowing the spiritual energy generated by the ley lines to automatically power the seal, forming a self-circulating cage.

"So you became the master of the Demon God Realm," Tongtian said coldly. "You seized this land not to become king, but to keep an eye on that seal."

The Demon Lord neither denied nor admitted it. He simply tilted his head slightly and looked at Tongtian: "Why do you think I built the Demon God Palace back then? This palace has no other purpose than to serve as a massive suppressing force, built directly above the seal, using the weight of the palace itself and the array structure to press down."

I have lived here for countless millennia, never leaving even once.

A hint of weariness finally crept into his voice. "Until recently—about 30,000 years ago—I began to sense that the seal was malfunctioning."

Chen Qing frowned: "What's the problem?"

"The supply is insufficient," the Demon Lord said. "The seal requires the earth's spiritual energy to function, but after millions of years of depletion, the earth's spiritual energy in the Demon God Realm has diminished to about 40% of its original level. The outermost two layers of the nine-layer seal are almost completely ineffective, and the third layer has also developed cracks. Based on that rate of decay, the nine-layer seal will completely collapse in at most another five hundred years."

Five hundred years is an unimaginable span of time for an ordinary person.

But for these saints who have lived for countless ages, five hundred years is but a fleeting moment. Chen Qing's brows furrowed even more deeply: "So you start digging? You're not going to help it escape, you're going to reinforce the seal?"

"Reinforcement?" The Demon Lord repeated the word, slowly shaking his head. "I did attempt reinforcement. But something happened before I could do it."

He paused, his gaze drifting to the void illuminated by the dark red crystals on the dome of the main hall, as if recalling an event that still seemed unbelievable to him: "About twelve thousand years ago, an old man in a gray robe appeared before me."

He claimed to be the will of the Heavenly Dao of the Demon God Realm and came to me to discuss submitting to the Primordial World.

I knew he was lying right then and there—I've lived in this place for tens of millions of years, and I know better than anyone what the will of Heaven is like.

But the aura emanating from him felt familiar. It took me a while to figure out the source of that familiarity, and then I realized that the gray-robed old man wasn't the will of Heaven; he was a tentacle of 'Devouring' extending from the Void, transformed into human form to test me.

Chen Qing and Tongtian exchanged a glance. The timeline the Demon Lord mentioned was much earlier than the time they had previously predicted when the gray-robed elder would appear.

"He came to me about submitting, without mentioning the seal at all. He wanted me to open a passage between the Demon God Realm and the Primordial World, connecting the Heavenly Dao networks of the two worlds."

The Demon Lord's voice turned cold. "Once the connection is complete, he can use the Heavenly Dao Network to gradually infiltrate the Primordial World with his original power from the Ruins of Return. In that case, even the last few layers of protection left by Pangu in the Primordial World will become ineffective."

"So you refused," Chen Qing said.

"I refused." The Demon Lord nodded, "but I acted like a greedy, ambitious man who wanted to monopolize the primordial world."

I told him that the primordial world could only be conquered by me alone, without the intervention of the will of Heaven.

This confirmed my assessment of the decay rate of the underground seal, but it also made another fact clear to me.

He looked at Chen Qing, his gaze suddenly becoming extremely sharp: "Five hundred years is too long. The gray-robed old man won't wait for me for five hundred years."

Now that he's begun his actions, his true form in the Ruins will definitely accelerate its breakthrough from the seal. Even if my underground seal can hold for another five hundred years, the Ruins might not even last a hundred.

Upon hearing this, a piece of the puzzle in Chen Qing's heart finally fit perfectly.

He spoke in a deep voice: "So you're breaking the seal not to reinforce it. You want to destroy it completely before it still has power."

The Demon Lord looked at Chen Qing, remained silent for a moment, and then slowly nodded: "More than three of the nine layers of the seal have decayed, and the remaining six layers are also damaged. They are no longer able to firmly hold down that limb as they were at the beginning."

Rather than waiting for it to disintegrate on its own and for that part to break through the surface and reconnect with the main body of the Ruins, it's better for me to personally break through the last few layers of seals and completely destroy it using more direct means before it has a chance to spread.

"What methods?" Tongtian pressed.

The Demon Lord did not answer immediately.

He turned and walked back to the stone platform, taking out a palm-sized black box from a hidden compartment on the side of the platform.

The box was completely unpatterned, and its material was neither metal nor wood or stone; it looked more like some kind of solidified liquid.

The Demon Lord placed the box on the table and slowly lifted the lid. Inside lay a fragment the size of a fingernail—a semi-transparent gold fragment that emitted an extremely faint, heart-like pulse.

The moment Chen Qing's gaze fell upon the golden fragments, the Pangu Dao Foundation within his body suddenly throbbed.

The last faint flame in the embers suddenly shot up, as if a piece of charcoal had been stirred and reignited.

He instinctively took a step forward, staring at the fragment, his voice involuntarily lowering slightly: "That's... Pangu's..."

"A fragment of Pangu's Dao Foundation." The Demon Lord finished the sentence for him. "When I constructed the seal, a fragment of Pangu's Dao Foundation drifted over from the Ruins of Return and fell into my hands."

At the time, I didn't know its purpose; I simply considered it a sturdy material and incorporated it into the core of the ninth and deepest layer of the seal. The seal's ability to withstand the test of time largely depended on the power of this fragment.

He closed the lid and gently pushed the black box toward Chen Qing: "But today, the power of this fragment is almost exhausted."

I need you to use the merged Pangu Dao Foundation to replenish the seal with new power. Not to reinforce it—but to guide it.

Guide the last remaining trace of Pangu's power within the seal to resonate with that severed limb, and then completely disintegrate it from within.

After listening, Chen Qing remained silent for a long time. He walked to the stone platform, placed his hands on the surface, and looked down at the black box.

The Pangu Dao Foundation within his body was slightly warming up, as if it had formed some kind of connection with the fragments in the box that spanned millions of years.

He could sense that the power contained in that fragment was extremely weak, but within that weakness lay an essence of utmost purity—the foundational power that Pangu had personally separated to suppress that "devouring" limb.

"Why did you choose to tell me this now?" Chen Qing raised his head, looking directly into the Demon Lord's eyes. "You could have found the Primordial World much earlier and laid this out on the table."

A complex emotion flashed in the Demon Lord's eyes. He remained silent for a moment, then spoke, his voice much lower than before: "Because I dare not. Since the gray-robed elder could extend a tentacle and transform into human form, it means that the main body of the Void has already developed a vague sense of perception. If I openly and publicly seek to discuss matters with the sages of the Primordial World, the gray-robed elder will sense something amiss—he will realize that I don't truly believe in that 'submission' rhetoric, and he will accelerate his breakthrough before I can act. Therefore, I can only pretend to be a demon who covets the Primordial World, keeping everyone outside."

He paused, shifting his gaze from Chen Qing's face to a vague corner of the hall: "But the fact that you two were able to sneak here means that you have temporarily sealed off the gray-robed elder."

Since he can no longer extend his senses, this is the final window of opportunity. Before he reopens his eyes from his slumber, completely destroy this section of his body underground—then his original form will forever be incomplete, never again able to return to the complete state Pangu faced.

Silence fell once more in the hall. The humming of the dark red crystal continued to echo, like a dense swarm of bees hovering in the unseen depths.

Xuan Ya huddled in the corner by the bronze door, almost pressed against the wall, his eyes wide open, listening intently to every word of the conversation. This child possessed extraordinary courage; in this situation, he didn't tremble with fear, but instead diligently tried to understand and memorize every piece of information.

Tongtian withdrew the wisp of sword intent that had been released and hung the Zhuxian Sword back on his waist.

He looked at the Demon Lord, his tone still carrying a hint of suspicion, though the sharpness had been dulled somewhat: "You said you sealed this thing in by yourself back then. What was your cultivation level at the time?"

"Not as good as it is now," the Demon Lord replied calmly, "but it's not low either. It's roughly equivalent to the level of a Quasi-Saint in your Primordial Era. It took a hundred years, exhausting all the rare and precious materials at hand, as well as two broken innate spiritual treasures picked up from the Chaos, to barely manage to set up the nine layers of seal."

Tongtian scoffed, "A quasi-saint spent a hundred years building a nine-layered seal, and now you, a saint, are watching from the sidelines and saying the seal can't hold? How come you're getting worse as you get older?"

The Demon Lord was not angered by this provocation. He simply raised his left hand and rolled up his sleeve.

His wrist and forearm were covered with a layer of dark gray stone-like texture. The texture was like snake scales, layer upon layer covering his skin, stretching from his wrist to his elbow, and looked shocking.

"My foundation was already eroded by the aura of that limb when the seal was constructed."

The Demon Lord lowered his sleeves, his voice as calm as if he were talking about someone else's business, "For millions of years, the erosion has been slowly deepening."

The power I can use has been decreasing year by year. Today, it is roughly equivalent to the level of a Taiyi Golden Immortal in your primordial world.

If that segment of the body underground really breaks free, I won't even be able to fight it head-on.

Tongtian fell silent. He stared at the Demon Lord's arm, which was covered in gray stone patterns, his lips moved, but he ultimately swallowed back his harsh words.

Chen Qing put the black box into his pocket and stood up straight.

His gaze swept over the dark red crystals on the walls of the hall, then over the smooth, mirror-like stone slabs beneath his feet, before finally settling on the Demon Lord's face: "Where is the entrance to the underground seal?"

"Right under your feet," said the Demon Lord.

Chen Qing looked down at the stone slab beneath his feet, where several faint lines did indeed appear, exactly the same as the lines on the stone tabletop.

But it looks like just an ordinary decoration, not at all like a sealed entrance.

The Demon Lord walked to the center of the hall, squatted down, and placed his palm on the center of those patterns.

A wisp of extremely thin black energy seeped from his palm, merging into the patterns on the surface, like a key being inserted into a lock.

The stone slabs slowly slid apart to reveal a spiral staircase leading downwards. Larger dark red crystals were embedded in the stone walls on both sides of the staircase, illuminating the deep and long underground passage as if it were dusk.

An extremely strong underground aura surged up from the passage.

The aura was a mixture of rotten mustiness, the smell of corroded metal, and a chilling, eerie feeling that Chen Qing was extremely familiar with, unique to the Ruins of Return.

It was as if opening this door connected this great hall directly to the eternal darkness deep within chaos.

"The passage between the third and fourth layers of seals is relatively safe."

The Demon Lord stood at the edge of the stone steps, looking down at the downward spiral. "The deeper you go, the more obvious the infiltration of that limb becomes. Below the seventh level, ordinary cultivators will be corrupted. But I don't think you'll be a problem."

Chen Qing didn't speak. He stood at the edge of the cave entrance, feeling the energy rising from the ground slowly gliding over his skin.

The chilling sensation created a strange conflict with the faint golden flame of Pangu's Dao Foundation in his dantian—like light and darkness silently battling each other with every breath.

He could feel the entity deep underground, which was sealed and suppressed layer by layer, slowly writhing, like a beast locked in an iron cage, each turn causing the cage to groan under its unbearable weight.

He turned to look at Tongtian: "You wait here. In case something happens to me down there..."

"Don't fucking spout this bullshit." Tongtian interrupted him directly, "I'll go down with you."

"What about the black crow?"

Tongtian glanced at the thin boy in the corner. Xuanya immediately sprang up from the wall, rushed over in a few strides, and followed closely behind Tongtian: "I'm going too! I'm not afraid!"

Tongtian looked down at the child, who was almost half his height, and remained silent for a moment before reaching out and patting him on the head: "Stay close, or no one will look for you if you get lost."

Chen Qing said nothing more. He took a step and stepped onto the spiraling stone steps leading downwards. Tongtian's footsteps followed closely behind, while Xuanya's footsteps were even lighter, falling at the very back, like a small shadow following behind an adult.

The Demon Lord did not descend. He stood in the center of the hall, watching the three figures descend the stone steps one by one. Dark red light moved across their backs, stretching their shadows long and distorted, casting them onto the stone wall behind them.

He watched the young man disappear around the corner of the stone steps, then slowly withdrew his gaze and looked back at the void illuminated by the crystals on the dome of the main hall, his expression weary and silent.

The stone steps were much longer than Chen Qing had imagined.

They descended for at least half an hour, not slowly, but the surrounding scenery remained almost unchanged—spiral stone walls, dark red crystals, and the ever-rising underground aura.

The air grew heavier and heavier, and breathing became a viscous resistance, as if walking in a thick liquid.

Xuan Ya's breathing became noticeably heavier, but he gritted his teeth and remained silent, following Tong Tian closely.

As they passed a stone archway engraved with ancient runes, Chen Qing stopped.

The runes on the archway were extremely blurry, most of them eroded beyond recognition by time and aura, but a few of the deeper engravings still retained clear outlines. He recognized them at a glance as marks left by Pangu's axe that opened the heavens—exactly the same as the Pangu engravings he had seen in various parts of the prehistoric world.

"The boundary of the third seal," Chen Qing said. He reached out and touched the stone wall at the edge of the archway. The moment his fingertips touched the engravings, an extremely faint arc of golden light sprang out from the engravings, gently touched his finger, and then went out, like someone who had been asleep for too long unconsciously moving a finger in a dream.

They continued down.

As we passed through the second archway, visible black mist began to appear in the surrounding air—the mist was not thick, but floated in wisps around the stone steps, like vengeful spirits imprisoned for thousands of years wandering silently.

Xuan Ya's face paled slightly, but he took out the magic crystal from his pocket and held it in his hand. The magic crystal emitted a faint light, pushing back the mist.

"Smart." Tongtian glanced at him and praised him.

As we passed through the third archway, the black mist thickened into a dense darkness, almost obscuring our vision. The dark red crystals on either side of the stone steps also lost their luster in the darkness, leaving only blurry red hues, like jellyfish floating in the deep sea.

Chen Qing had no choice but to activate the faint Pangu Golden Light within his body, spreading it within a foot radius around his body to barely illuminate the path beneath his feet.

The fourth archway was no longer recognizable; the runes on it were completely covered by a thick layer of black substance, like some kind of solidified grease.

Chen Qing swept the golden light across the attached objects, which melted a layer of them slightly, making a sizzling sound and revealing the outlines of the remaining runes underneath.

The aura emanating from that silhouette grew stronger and stronger, drawing ever closer to the suffocating, heart-pounding feeling deep within the Ruins of Return.

When they finally reached the end of the stone steps, a bright and open space opened up before them.

It was an extremely spacious underground space, like the hollowed-out belly of a mountain.

The dome is so high that it seems to reach the horizon, and the surrounding rock walls are at least a thousand feet in diameter.

In the center of the space, a slowly writhing, living black substance floated. The substance was about the size of a small mountain, its surface covered with fine cracks and wrinkles, like a huge, charred heart beating slightly in a chest cavity.

Eight thick golden chains extended from the rock strata of the four walls of the space, firmly locking themselves into the interior of the black substance.

Each chain was engraved with dense runes, which emitted a dim golden light, enveloping the black substance layer by layer.

However, the golden light had clearly weakened to its limit, and some chains even showed visible fine cracks. Black substance was slowly seeping out from those cracks, dripping down the surface of the chains like oozing fluid from a wound.

Beyond the eight chains, there was a thickest and brightest golden chain that pierced through the space from the top to the bottom. The chain was formed entirely of materialized light, and countless tiny golden fragments could be vaguely seen flowing within the light—those were fragments of Pangu's Dao Foundation, the deepest layer of seal mentioned by the Demon Lord, and the core of the entire nine-layered seal.

Chen Qing stood on the platform at the edge of the space, gazing at the scene before him, and remained silent for a long time.

The pulsation of that black substance resonated strangely with him across the entire void. Each pulsation caused the embers of Pangu's Dao Foundation in Chen Qing's dantian to light up slightly, like two distant magnets sensing each other.

He could sense that the power contained within that mass of matter was extremely ancient and immense, much weaker than the aura of the giant eye deep within the Ruins of Return, but essentially identical—a part of the same body, of the same origin, of the same substance, and of the same being severed off.

"It knows I'm here," Chen Qing said softly.

Tongtian stood beside him, and the Four Swords of Zhuxian silently rose an inch from their sheaths, their blades gleaming like stars in the darkness: "When did it first know?"

Chen Qing sensed it for a moment, then slowly said, "From the moment I stepped onto the third stone step, its pulsation rhythm changed, becoming slightly faster than before. It's observing me."

He paused, turned to look at Tongtian, his eyes filled with an extremely calm judgment, "I'm going down to approach that core seal. You and Xuanya stay on the platform and don't go any closer."

If that thing breaks free of its chains, don't worry about me. Take the Black Crow and go back the way you came. Tell the Demon Lord what happened and have him close the entrance to the underground passage.

Tongtian's lips pressed into a tight line. He neither nodded nor shook his head, but after a moment of silence, he said, "Hurry up."

Chen Qing said no more. He took a deep breath, leaped off the platform, and his figure drew an arc in the void as he sped toward the golden chain that pierced the heavens and earth above the black mass of matter in the center of the space.

As he approached the core seal, the black substance pulsated at a frequency that suddenly doubled. The eight chains on the four walls of the space simultaneously emitted a piercing metallic scraping sound. The black exudate that had been slowly seeping in suddenly accelerated, gushing outwards along the surface of the chains, like a group of snakes awakened and poking their heads out at the same time.

Chen Qing didn't hesitate at all. He formed a hand seal, and the golden afterglow of the Pangu Dao Foundation within his body suddenly surged up, gathering into a golden ball of light the size of an egg in his palm.

He swooped down, grabbed the ball with both hands, and pressed it straight down into the middle of the core seal chain.

The moment the golden light touched the lock, the entire underground space trembled violently, as if it had been shaken by an invisible giant hand from the outside.

The black mass emitted an extremely deep, long howl—a sound unlike anything any living being could make, more like the silent shriek of a torn void in a vacuum.

Tongtian gripped the Zhuxian Sword tightly, his gaze fixed on Chen Qing's figure, not daring to blink.

The black crow hid behind a stone pillar at the edge of the platform, its eyes peering through its fingers as it watched the golden light and the boundless darkness violently tear, collide, and merge in mid-air.

Outside the nine layers of seals, in the main hall of the Demon God Palace, the Demon Lord still stood in the same spot, gazing up at the dark red dome.

He felt the ground beneath his feet trembling slightly, once, twice, three times, each time more violent than the last.

His hand, covered in gray stone patterns, trembled slightly as it hung at his side, and then he slowly closed his eyes.

"Descendant of Pangu," he whispered in a voice only he could hear, "don't let me down."