Starting as the heir of a marquis's mansion, I gained access to a summoning system.

The group set off again.

After walking less than fifty feet, a crack appeared on the bone wall on the left side of the spinal cord passage.

The crack was different from those that were naturally formed. It split straight up from bottom to top, with unusually clean edges, as if it had been cleaved by a sharp weapon. The surrounding bone walls were a dark red, like bloodstains from years past. The crack was pitch black, with no marrow fluid seeping out; instead, a very faint, very light breathing sound could be heard coming from within.

The sound of breathing was separate from the sound of pulse; with each breath, it was as if wind was blowing out from the crack, carrying a very faint, rusty smell.

"This is it," Lin Xiaoman said.

The crack was narrow, allowing only one person to pass sideways.

Chuan Ying stepped forward, using his palm as a blade to lightly slice along the edge of the crack. A blade of energy vanished into the darkness, instantly becoming silent. He frowned: "The space inside isn't large, but it's very deep. There's no sign of life."

"No living creatures, but spirit remains," Dongfang Weiwo said. He closed his eyes and sensed, his bone domain perception spreading out like a tide. The range of perception was severely compressed within this marrow passage, like listening to sounds underwater, everything was blurry and indistinct. He barely managed to grasp the situation deep within the crack—there was a tiny chamber there, enveloped by some kind of power, with extremely dense bone walls, unlike the rest of the corridor.

"We can go in," Dongfang Weiwo said. "Xiaoman, go in first, I'll follow."

"It's too dangerous for the little girl to go in," Wu Wudi said. "I'll go first."

"I'll go in," Lin Xiaoman said calmly, handing the Divine Demon Marrow Bead to Yan Fei and freeing her hands. The wound on her left palm reopened, and blood seeped out. She pressed her palm against the bone wall at the edge of the crack.

"Buzz—"

The crimson patterns at the edge of the crack suddenly lit up, like a long-dormant array being activated. Lin Xiaoman released her grip; the patterns were now burning hot. The darkness within the crack began to recede, revealing what lay within half a foot: the bone walls were smooth as a mirror, and a narrow passage extended diagonally downwards, like a naturally formed crack in the stone.

"It really was meant for the person guarding the token," Wan Wujiu said from behind, his voice devoid of emotion. "My seal has no effect on it. This definitely wasn't left by the Demon God Lü."

Lin Xiaoman ignored him and squeezed into the crevice. Dongfang Weiwo followed closely behind.

The crevice was extremely narrow, with the bone walls pressed against the shoulders and back, requiring the body to turn sideways with every step. The ground was uneven, like stepping on the ridges of joints. Lin Xiaoman walked ahead, her blue hair emitting a faint glow in the darkness, the silver bells on her hair ribbon occasionally tinkling softly.

After walking about twenty steps, the view suddenly opened up before us.

It was a tiny, circular chamber, no more than seven feet high and twenty feet wide. In the very center of the chamber stood a bone.

A complete finger bone.

Thicker than a normal person's thigh, it stood upright in the ground. The bone surface was dark gold, covered with densely packed tiny characters, finer than a needle tip, yet each stroke as clear as if carved with a knife. The characters were written in an extremely ancient script, one that I alone in the East did not recognize, but Lin Xiaoman did.

"It is the burial text of ancient gods and demons."

She spoke softly, walked to the finger bone, knelt down, and, by the light of the blood seeping from the wound on her palm, carefully examined each word. Her face turned very pale.

"What are you writing?" Wu Wudi squeezed in.

"It wasn't written by Lu Moshen." Lin Xiaoman's voice was extremely soft, as if afraid of disturbing something. "These are the last words left by the ancient gods and demons themselves."

The entire chamber fell silent.

"It's the lingering attachment of that demonic corpse, carved here by the hand of Demon God Lü," Lin Xiaoman murmured, her voice extremely low, pausing at each word.

"After my death, my bones split into three places. One in Tianwu, one in Wanxing, and one in Guixu. The Tianwu bone grew nine joints, forming the base. The Wanxing bone grew eight fragments, forming the arms. The Guixu bone grew a knot, forming the heart. If someone later gathers the nine bones of Tianwu and the eight fragments of Wanxing, and retrieves the heart from Guixu, then I will be revived."

"This is not a pact of burial," Yan Fei's voice rang out behind Dongfang Weiwo. "This is a method of resurrection."

Dongfang Weiwo remained outwardly calm, but inwardly it felt as if the words on his finger bones were being hammered into his very bones.

"There's more to come," Lin Xiaoman said, her voice trembling slightly. "But resurrection is not my wish. I wish that those who come after me will take my bones, inherit my strength, and guard this place in my place. Therefore, I leave this bone as a vow: whoever can come here and see these words is of the same origin as me. They may break this finger bone, take its marrow, and fuse it into their own body. If they fuse, their left arm will naturally form. If they fuse, they will not be able to be resurrected. If they fuse, they will surely fulfill my unfulfilled promise."

Lin Xiaoman raised her head, her eyes flashing with azure-gold light: "Dongfang, this is not Lu Moshen's intention. This is the choice left by the original Primordial God-Demon before his death. When he came to Tianwu Continent, he already did not wish to be resurrected."

"But when he was gathering bones in Tianxuan, those voices didn't say that," Dongfang Weiwo said. He remembered clearly that with each fragment he fused, the voice in his ears became clearer, carrying a desolation and indifference from eternity.

"Because gods and demons also have their own thoughts," Lin Xiaoman said. "The bones, blood, and souls of gods and demons each have their own obsessions. The skeleton wants to be resurrected, while the original god or demon wants to rest in peace. Why does Demon God Lü want you to collect all the bones?"

Dongfang Wei did not answer the question immediately.

Wan Wujiu's voice drifted in from outside the crack, this time with obvious urgency: "What did you see inside? I urge you to come out quickly. Something is coming through the main marrow passage."

Before the words were even finished, the cavity suddenly vibrated. The dark gold characters on the inserted finger bone seemed to be activated, lighting up one by one. The entire cavity began to contract, like a fist slowly clenching.

"It has sensed the aura of the main marrow passage," Lin Xiaoman said. "We can't stay here any longer. The seal on the finger bone is connected to the corridor, and it will automatically close when an enemy approaches."

"What about the 'fractured finger bone, marrow extraction' mentioned in the inscription?" Wu Wudi looked around, his broken sword held horizontally in front of his chest. "Should I take it now or not?"

Dongfang Weiwo looked at the finger bone. The dark gold characters had all lit up, like a fine golden flame burning on the surface of the bone. There was a faint sound of liquid flowing within the bone, extremely soft, like a pulse from ancient times.

The heavy pulsation outside suddenly intensified, as if something was pounding against the bone walls of the corridor. The entire chamber felt like it was being squeezed in a giant hand, with the walls pressing in.

"It's coming this way," Wan Wujiu's voice shrilly came from outside the crack. "If you don't come out soon, the side entrance will be sealed off!"

Lin Xiaoman suddenly looked up: "It's your decision."

Dongfang Weiwo stared at the finger bone, raised his hand, and then withdrew it.

"It won't crack," he said.

Lin Xiaoman was taken aback.

"I don't believe everything written here," Dongfang Weiwo said, his voice short but very steady. "The words left by the Blood Demon God Lü were meant for me to come here and see them. But seeing them doesn't mean doing them. This finger bone has been here for thirty years, neither being eaten by the eroded body nor taken by Wan Wujiu. There must be a reason for that."

"Walk."

He grabbed Lin Xiaoman's hand and rushed out of the crack.

Behind him, the writing on the finger bone slowly faded, like a pair of closed eyes.

As soon as everyone squeezed out, a foul stench rushed towards them from the main marrow passage.

In the darkness ahead, three grayish-white shadows crawled out from the depths of the spinal cord, their bodies hunched over and their limbs bent backward, like people whose bones had been broken and then reattached.

They have no facial features, only mouthparts that open and close constantly.

Their bodies were more intact than the previously seen erosion bodies, with distinct ribs and a spine running through them under the grayish-white outer membrane, like a living person wrapped in a layer of adipocere.

"All three together," Wan Wujiu said, his voice surprisingly calm. "They've learned to surround us. Be careful; they're much stronger than the previous ones."

He took two steps back, disappearing into the darkness behind him. The snow-white little beast jumped onto his shoulder, its vertical pupils and black bean eyes both fixed on the battlefield.

Wu Wudi took a step forward, his broken blade sweeping horizontally. The blade energy was like a bolt of lightning, striking the shoulder and neck of the nearest eroding creature. The blade cut three inches in, only to be bounced back by the outer membrane. The creature hissed, its right arm whipping out like a whip. Wu Wudi dodged to the side, the blow striking the bone wall, sending bone dust flying.

"These are troublesome," Wu Wudi said.

Swallow Flying Sword was already unsheathed. Grayish-white powder shed from the crack between his brows, and his sword domain silently unfolded. Within a radius of several feet, the laws were briefly rewritten. The movements of the three eroding entities all paused, as if they had sunk into a viscous swamp.

"The mouth of the one on the left will open in three breaths," Yan Fei said, his voice cold and clear.

Chuan Ying had already moved. He unleashed both palms simultaneously, two blades of energy tracing intersecting arcs, forcing the one on the right to retreat. His movements were unhurried, using his palms as blades, each strike precisely landing on the opponent's joints, deflecting the attack.

"The one in the middle is the master," Dongfang Weiwo said. He pointed his longsword forward, and his marrow fire surged. Lin Xiaoman's blood still lingered on his left palm. He gripped his sword and pressed down, and the blue flames rose again.

Lin Xiaoman had retreated to the side of the crack, her back pressed against the bone wall.

Blood kept flowing from her left palm, but she didn't make a sound. She just stared wide-eyed at Dongfang Weiwo's back.

The three-headed erosion creatures approached in a fan shape. Their mouthparts emitted a constant hissing sound, and beneath their grayish-white membranes, the seventeen faces seemed to have blended in as well, each contorting in a different direction.

Dongfang Weiwo took a step forward towards the middle.

The thing opened its mouth wide, and a tubular bone spur emerged from deep within its dense toothed rings, piercing straight into his face.

He turned to the side, the bone spur grazing his cheek, the wind it generated cutting his skin and scattering drops of blood. He flipped his left palm, his hand, covered in marrow fire, grabbing the bone spur and pulling it back sharply. The thing was pulled forward.

The longsword was thrust into its mouthparts from bottom to top.

Dark gold flames poured in.

It was as if gunpowder had been ignited inside the thing, and dark golden light shot out from its seven orifices. It struggled and hissed, its body swelled violently, and then exploded with a "boom." Grayish-white fragments scattered everywhere, hitting the bone walls with a "crackling" sound.

Almost simultaneously, Wu Wudi chopped off a broken arm on the left side with his broken blade.

No blood flowed from the cut, but a large amount of grayish-white viscous fluid gushed out, hardening upon contact with air. Instead of retreating, the thing advanced, crashing into his arms. Wu Wudi groaned, his back slamming against the bone wall, the broken sword still embedded in its shoulder and neck.

He grabbed the edge of its mouthparts with one hand and ripped off a large piece of the grayish-white outer membrane. Beneath the membrane, a human face was clearly revealed—the face of a young man, his eyes and brows tightly closed, with a faint smile on his lips.

Wu Wudi paused.

"They're all human." Wan Wujiu's voice came from behind, tinged with undisguised pleasure. "People from thirty years ago. That's why I said, the deeper you go, the more human they seem. Can you bring yourself to do it?"

The young man suddenly opened his eyes. There were no pupils, only a grayish-white color. His mouth opened wide, and he moved his entire face towards Wu Wudi, as if he wanted to swallow him whole.

Wu Wudi gritted his teeth, slashed horizontally with his broken blade, and sliced ​​off the face along with its outer membrane. The thing hissed and retreated, spraying liquid all over Wu Wudi's face.

He wiped his face and spat, "I've killed plenty of people."

The one on the right was forced to retreat step by step by Chuan Ying. He raised one palm, condensed the qi blade to the extreme, and slashed down from above.

The eroding body split in two from its head to its lower abdomen. The two halves were still writhing when Chuan Ying struck again, shattering them into pieces.

The three eroding entities died almost simultaneously.