đź“– Chapter 1175 - Good!
Viewed from above, the temple was located at the top of a mountain that was so huge its base couldn’t be seen. Although the top of this world below the Underworld River was the head of the huge statue, the spot below the statue was still the mountain’s peak.
Thus, the temple was said to be at the top of the mountain.
After Wang Baole’s shenanigans, the world that contained the red-clothed woman was revealed. It was indeed the inside of the temple, and the one the temple worshipped was none other than the red-clothed woman. This actually wasn’t very surprising.
However… after stepping through the entrance to the next floor, what Wang Baole saw caused his heart to tremble. It was still another world, but it wasn’t a natural one. Instead, it was man-made. To be precise, rather than a world, it was more like… a sealed cave!
Wang Baole found himself falling through the air as soon as he entered the cave. The top of the cave seemed to be affected by a strange divine ability, turning it into a sky. There seemed to be no end to this heaven and earth; however, it was just that the end was difficult to detect with the naked eye. As Wang Baole’s divine sense swept out, he sensed the existence of some invisible barrier hundreds of thousands of li away.
Below him… was a vast land, full of picturesque mountains and rivers. Aside from the fact that there were no living beings, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
Nothing except… the stone stele in the very center of the world. This stele was inscribed with three words.
They were written in the script of the Underworld Sect.
“Underworld Emperor Tomb!”
Indeed, the stele was a tombstone. And what made Wang Baole’s heart shake even more was what could be seen on the tombstone behind the words. It was a painting.
This painting was of an upside-down pagoda buried deep in a mountain. On top of the pagoda was a temple, and above the temple was a statue. Both the temple and the statue were almost exactly the same as the ones outside.
Painted on the floor of the pagoda deepest in the mountain, the place that would have been at the top had it been oriented normally, was a coffin.
The coffin had an eye painted on it. As soon as Wang Baole saw this eye, the call coming from his Underworld Fire intensified. However, this wasn’t what made his heart tremble.
The thing that made his heart tremble was what he saw on the first floor at the top of the upside-down pagoda. Painted there were mountains and rivers as well as a stele.
Moreover… there was a tiny dot just beside the stele, and there was also a black hand some distance away. The black hand was open and seemed to be trying to grab the tiny dot.
As soon as he saw this tiny dot, Wang Baole instantly moved away from his original spot. His heart shook as he swept the world with his divine sense again before looking back at the tombstone.
Obviously, the painting on the tombstone was the structure of this Underworld Emperor Tomb. The place he was in right now was the ground floor of the pagoda!
And that tiny dot… no matter how Wang Baole looked at it, it seemed to be depicting none other than himself!
This was nothing more than his intuition, but if the dot really did represent himself… Wang Baole’s divine sense was on maximum alert. If the painting on the tombstone was a reflection of reality, then… where was the black hand?
“Something’s wrong!” Wang Baole was extremely vigilant. As he checked his surroundings, he couldn’t help but notice the eerie silence of this world. Aside from himself, he hadn’t heard any noise at all ever since arriving here.
Even the flowing rivers down below were completely silent.
Wang Baole narrowed his eyes. Leaving behind a wisp of divine will, he charged out at high speed, carefully observing everything in this world. He wanted to find the way to the next floor, but no matter how hard he searched, he couldn’t find anything resembling an entrance.
However, he did see some strange landforms.
These landforms were depressions in the ground in the shape of handprints. Across this silent world, there were three in total, and each was about ten thousand zhang wide. Moreover, at the center of these three handprints, Wang Baole saw… corpses!
Each handprint contained one corpse, and these corpses were extremely withered. It was as if all their essence, qi, flesh, and blood had been swallowed up, leaving Wang Baole unable to identify them from their appearances. However, he could tell from their clothes as well as their auras that these three corpses… were Underworld Sect cultivators.
Apparently, even though these three had used some unknown method to get past the red-clothed woman in the temple up above… they died tragically in this place.
After observing them carefully, Wang Baole discovered that these people had died because their divine souls had been swallowed by something. As for their flesh and blood… it had been absorbed after their divine souls disappeared.
And the thing that absorbed their flesh and blood was none other than the land itself!
Wang Baole could smell a faint scent of blood coming from the ground around the three corpses.
All of this made the world even more eerie.
Wang Baole’s eyes shone coldly. Withdrawing his gaze from the corpses, he continued searching for the entrance to the next floor. But soon, he abruptly came to a stop, and his expression changed drastically. That was because the wisp of divine will he left behind to observe the stele suddenly sent him a message.
The scene in the painting had changed!
In the painted first floor of the pagoda, the tiny dot representing Wang Baole had moved away from the stele. Right now, it was exactly where Wang Baole currently was. At the same time… the black hand creeping behind it had gotten even closer!
And there was no longer just one black hand. Instead, ten black hands were surrounding the tiny dot from all directions.
Wang Baole’s expression instantly darkened.
“Pretending to be mysterious!” As he spoke, the Underworld Fire erupted in his body and bright light flashed through his eyes. His divine soul burst out and scanned his surroundings.
But there was nothing there!
Narrowing his eyes, Wang Baole simply stood there and didn’t move. However, the intrinsic scabbard in his body vibrated, and a monstrous sword qi emanated faintly from his body. He coldly stared all around himself.
But he… still couldn’t see anything. However, the wisp of divine will at the stele saw astonishing changes in the painting.
There, the tiny dot represented by Wang Baole was no longer surrounded by just ten black hands. One hundred, one thousand… with every passing instant, more and more black hands appeared, and it didn’t take more than a few breaths for Wang Baole’s location to be surrounded by tens of thousands of them.
They crowded densely around Wang Baole, almost as if… they were fusing into a single giant hand. And Wang Baole’s current location was precisely in the palm of this hand.
However, Wang Baole didn’t feel any sense of crisis at all. It could be said that if he hadn’t left a wisp of divine will near the stele, he would still be completely in the dark.
The huge hand formed by the amalgamation of countless black hands made Wang Baole think of the strange landforms he’d noticed earlier, as well as the corpses inside.
“No, something’s wrong!” Frowning, Wang Baole looked around, then glanced in the direction of the stele. His heart was full of doubts. If this place was really so dangerous, then why was the stele there to warn him?
For a place with the intent to kill all comers, the stone stele seemed completely superfluous. In fact, it almost seemed like… it was here to serve as a guidepost and warn those with ill intentions!
“This is the Underworld Emperor’s tomb. I am the Underworld Child, and everyone who came here is a member of the Underworld Sect… Plus, they even have the aura of the Heavenly Dao on them. Logically speaking, there shouldn’t be any danger here. After all, we’re all from the same sect!
“The thing with the red-clothed woman up above could be considered an accident. She’s a living thing, so her thoughts and intentions can naturally change with the passing of time. But this place is already part of the tomb…” Muttering to himself, Wang Baole tried to think about the problem from a different perspective. After a while, his eyes suddenly widened.
“Is it to distinguish between good and evil?”
Wang Baole felt that there was a certain possibility that this was the answer. If his heart was filled with respect and benevolence, then he wouldn’t care about the hands all around him because he would be certain that no harm would come to him in this place. However, if he came here with wicked intentions… he would definitely be panicked.
Wang Baole silently watched as the number of hands in the stele’s painting grew more and more. It seemed that it wouldn’t take long to completely form one giant hand. But at that moment, Wang Baole’s eyes suddenly flashed and he cut off the wisp of divine will watching the stele. No longer paying attention to the painting, he just bowed deeply toward the stele.
“Ancestor Underworld Emperor, disciple Wang Baole is here on behalf of the Heavenly Dao to retrieve your remains. I know this is extremely disrespectful, but doing this will restore the Heavenly Dao to its former glory and allow us to continue carrying out Allheaven’s will. Ancestor, please grant my wish.” Wang Baole remained in his bowing position for a while before slowly straightening his back. Then, as if he wasn’t even aware that there was an invisible black hand all around him, he restrained his cultivation base, returned his intrinsic scabbard to silence, and calmly started walking.
One step, ten steps, a hundred steps, a thousand steps…
Ten zhang, a hundred zhang, a thousand zhang, ten thousand zhang…
Just like that, Wang Baole walked until he left the range of the giant hand. Not once did he encounter danger. As he walked further and further, the void in front of him fluctuated, and a door of light appeared.
When the door of light appeared, Wang Baole finally breathed a sigh of relief. He seemed to vaguely hear an ethereal voice echoing in his ears, spreading like ripples over a calm pond.
“Good.”