Chapter 1474: Auspicious and Fortunate (Third Update)
"Truly an old hand!"
Shujun couldn't help but praise: "With that move of yours, we can have no worries about the rear. But I'm also an old hand—we just need to take the paths we've walked before, and we can retreat unscathed!"
Wei Suifeng said, "Let's hope so."
"What do you mean, 'let's hope so'? Crow's mouth! Auspicious and fortunate!"
Shujun laughed heartily and stepped first into the Ancestral Court Jade Capital City.
Wei Suifeng followed behind him, his heart filled with tension. He looked around and saw that this Ancestral Court Jade Capital City was vastly different from the Jade Capital City of the Heavenly Court.
The Ancestral Court Jade Capital City was extremely dilapidated. Aside from the vast Dao aura that had surged forth when the seal was broken, there was also a peculiar deathly aura. He keenly sensed that under the influence of this aura, the Dao laws he had cultivated were showing signs of collapsing and disintegrating!
This was the aura of withering Dao. His own Dao laws were constantly breaking down, slowly losing the power of Dao techniques and divine abilities!
He also felt his physical body and primordial spirit being invaded. Originally, his lifespan was as eternal as heaven and earth, but now he could sense that his lifespan had an end. For every moment he lingered in this divine city, his life was shortened by a day.
As they ventured deeper into the city, the rate at which his lifespan drained accelerated!
Whoosh—
A hot wind blew, stirring several skulls on the ground. Shujun's face changed color slightly, and he quickly pulled Wei Suifeng into a rapid dash, stopping beneath a withered giant tree. He stood there nervously, staring at the hot wind.
The hot wind swept the skulls past with a roar, and one skull rolled to the base of the tree with a clattering sound.
Strangely enough, standing beneath this withered tree, they couldn't feel the hot wind at all.
Wei Suifeng reached out a hand, about to feel the wind, when Shujun slapped his hand heavily, knocking it down.
"Don't touch that wind!"
Shujun was extremely tense, his voice hoarse: "I call it the Wind of Heat Death. If you touch it, even your primordial spirit will burn to ashes!"
Wei Suifeng's heart leaped, and he quickly asked, "How powerful is this Wind of Heat Death?"
"Back then, when our Creator clan brought many experts and ancient gods to explore this place, we encountered this wind for the first time. Aside from those who hid under the tree, everyone else died."
Shujun took out a large hammer and smashed it fiercely at the skull. The skull, which should have belonged to a Creator, suddenly sprouted limbs and a skeleton, making creaking sounds, before Shujun shattered it with a single hammer blow.
"It's complete annihilation of body and spirit."
Shujun let out a breath, waved his hand to toss the broken bones away, and said flatly, "Not even a trace of divine consciousness remains. Even the Dao of the ancient gods turned to dust."
Wei Suifeng looked at the bone fragments on the ground, a puzzled expression on his face.
Shujun said, "It was affected by the tree behind us. This tree should be what Celestial Venerable Mu once called a Dao Tree, also known as a World Tree. The Great Black Tree is one such World Tree. Although this tree is dead, its residual might remains, guarding this spot and blocking the Wind of Heat Death. However, this tree absolutely cannot be touched. Back then, when we fled to the tree, some people touched it and changed."
His expression turned strange: "They turned into someone else—or rather, not human anymore. They even killed several of our experts..."
"What an unlucky place..." Wei Suifeng shivered several times and tightened his collar.
After the Wind of Heat Death passed, they left the withered tree. Wei Suifeng looked around and saw that the Ancestral Court Jade Capital City was filled with broken halls and collapsed buildings. Even the Dao patterns on these palace structures had been worn down to faint, blurry lines.
Among the crumbling walls and ruins, there were pools of chaotic qi, extremely heavy, like small ponds. Wei Suifeng even saw that this chaotic qi had frozen solid!
Just as they passed by, a white mist rose from one patch of frozen chaotic qi, like a head with indistinct features, exhaling a cold breath toward them.
Shujun quickly pulled Wei Suifeng and fled for their lives, dodging the cold wind, and said rapidly, "That's the Wind of Cold Death, a cold wind formed by condensed chaos. If the cold wind touches you, everything dissolves into void!"
Wei Suifeng had no choice but to follow him in escape. Before they had run far, Wei Suifeng suddenly froze, staring ahead. In the Jade Capital City before them, thousands of palaces and tens of thousands of halls were arranged in an orderly fashion. Though dilapidated, one could still imagine their former grandeur.
However, in front of every single palace stood a withered tree!
Hundreds of dead Dao trees came into his view. Wei Suifeng swallowed hard, his throat dry, his mind utterly blank and stunned.
Shujun dragged him in a mad dash, stopping only when they reached another withered Dao tree. He turned to watch the Wind of Cold Death blowing toward them.
Wei Suifeng obediently stood by his side. Shujun said, "Don't touch."
Wei Suifeng nodded obediently.
Shujun stared nervously at the Wind of Cold Death, not taking his eyes off it, and said, "Back then, Divine King Boyang was our big brother. His divine consciousness cultivation was extremely strong... well, a little stronger than mine. He mainly relied on Long Xiao. The two of them joined forces to investigate this Wind of Cold Death. He told us that when this wind blows, all matter dissolves, no substance moves anymore, and the particles that make up matter keep splitting until they can split no further. And when they split to the smallest point, the distance between each particle becomes infinitely vast..."
Wei Suifeng could no longer imagine such a scenario.
"This is the void. Even the Thirty-Five Layers of Void aren't as formidable as this void."
Shujun's big head was covered in fluffy hair. He licked his lips and said, "Boyang and Long Xiao speculated that above the Thirty-Five Layers of Void, there is another layer of void, most likely the void created by this Wind of Cold Death. He called it the Ultimate Void. He guessed that the Wind of Cold Death in this city might be fragments of the Ultimate Void, and this wind should be blown out by the ghosts of those who died in the Ultimate Void..."
The void had the power of virtualization. Any living being or substance that stepped into the void would be virtualized.
So-called virtualization meant that when a person stepped into the void, their body would grow larger and larger, thinner and thinner, gradually transforming from a real form into a virtual state.
The material particles that made up this person would have the distance between them stretched and extended continuously, until eventually, the entire person turned into a collection of unrelated particles, disappearing into the void.
This situation was virtualization.
Qin Mu's third level of the Dao realm, the Great Luo Heaven Gathering Perfection, used the principles of void and divine consciousness. It was a Dao realm technique he had comprehended from the knowledge of the Creator clan.
Wei Suifeng stared blankly into the distance.
Shujun kept his eyes fixed on the Wind of Cold Death, waiting for it to pass. Suddenly, Wei Suifeng tugged at his sleeve. Shujun said, "Wait a little longer. This wind hasn't completely passed yet..."
Wei Suifeng tugged at his collar again. Shujun said impatiently, "I told you to wait. If we go out now, we'll hit the tail of the wind. A light brush and we'll be done for..."
Wei Suifeng couldn't help but say, "Shujun, when you came here last time, did you notice any living people in the city?"
"What living people? This city is a dead city. Not even a ghost, let alone a living person..."
Shujun turned around. Wei Suifeng pursed his lips and said in a trembling voice, "Up ahead... it looks like there's a living person..."