Chapter 1654: Arrival (Asking for Monthly Votes!)
Qin Mu drifted through the Abandoned Land, this cesspool of the Ultimate Void vast and expansive, as if everything from sixteen cosmic epochs that had not been destroyed was discarded here.
He passed by a withered Dao Tree, completely dead, yet Qin Mu still sensed a faint wisp of consciousness within it.
He wanted to examine it closely, but that consciousness was extremely simple and crude, offering no response to him, as if trapped in a chaotic state, providing him with no information.
"This cultivator who achieved the Dao must have had his consciousness beaten into a chaotic state during the Great Extinction Calamity," Qin Mu thought to himself.
The consciousness hiding within the Dao Tree could no longer survive; it would never awaken.
Qin Mu departed. The various objects in the Abandoned Land of the Ultimate Void were not fixed, constantly flowing. Trying to find the portal containing the obelisks was like searching for a needle in a haystack.
Moreover, he couldn't use his divine sense here; it would be nullified and turned to nothing by the Ultimate Void. He could only rely on his eyesight to search.
Days passed one by one. Qin Mu encountered countless bizarre things, even coming across the ruins of Heavenly Capital City several more times, but he still couldn't find that portal.
During these days, his legs gradually grew back, becoming almost as long as before, though still somewhat thin and weak. His primordial spirit also slowly strengthened, but returning to its peak state would require much more arduous cultivation.
At its peak, his primordial spirit was vast. If pushed to the extreme, it could cover an entire universe realm. Though not as terrifying as Nether Lord's primordial spirit, it was still extraordinary.
Now, his primordial spirit was only over ten zhang tall, not even matching cultivators at the Life and Death or Heavenly River realms.
Even so, he remained one of the most powerful beings in the current world!
His physical body and primordial spirit were both refined from Primal Chaos Primordial Qi, following the path of the Miluo Palace Master, while his cultivation path also subtly aligned with the path of the Heavenly Capital Master, combining the strengths of both.
"I'll search for another two years. If I can't find that portal in two years, I'll return to Yancheng!"
Qin Mu endured solitude alone, searching bitterly in the Abandoned Land. He saw a head impaled on a flag, a woman combing her hair in a bronze mirror, and a broken divine weapon that continuously bled.
He also saw a Dao Fruit constantly growing human heads, only to have them weathered away by the cold, desolate wind.
Beyond that, he encountered groups of coffins, chained together in rows, drifting through the boundless void.
This Abandoned Land was filled with strange and bizarre things.
Earlier, Qin Mu had planned to collect some treasures from the Abandoned Land, but after seeing these strange objects, he abandoned the idea.
These things were also filth to him, not only useless but extremely dangerous. He had been chased several times by a strange head and a broken ship. When trying to collect that mottled bronze mirror, he was almost pulled into it by the combing woman. As for the head on the flag, it had already grown together with the flag, inseparable!
Even more terrifying, everything here harbored hidden mysteries. They were trapped in the Abandoned Land, blown by the cold, desolate wind, unable to leave. If Qin Mu took them out of the Abandoned Land, he would be helping these things, bringing great disaster to the world!
"Many immortals are hidden within the things in the Abandoned Land."
The more Qin Mu saw, the more certain he was of his guess. Some beings who hadn't died in the Great Calamity of Birth and Extinction were hiding within various treasures, waiting for the right time to awaken.
They were immortals, unerasable even by the Ultimate Void. The Abandoned Land was a natural prison, trapping them here, preventing their escape.
Taking these treasures away would actually help them!
The two-year deadline gradually approached. Qin Mu's mood shifted from anxiety to calm. The door panel landed on a huge coffin, and Qin Mu sat on it. From inside the coffin came a pounding sound, as if a living person was trapped within.
The door panel was very heavy, enough to suppress whatever was inside the coffin.
Qin Mu knocked on the door panel and chuckled, "Old friend inside, I'm just hitching a ride. Why so impatient?"
A muffled roar came from the coffin, and the pounding grew more urgent, as if some monster was banging its head against the coffin lid.
Qin Mu laughed heartily and looked up ahead.
Ahead, rows of coffins chained together, end to end, drifted toward the distant darkness.
Qin Mu planned to rest on these coffins for a while. As for what was buried in the coffin group, he didn't want to know at all.
These years of long-distance travel had worn him out. His legs still hadn't fully recovered, so he needed to stop and rest.
Just then, Qin Mu's smile gradually faded, and he stood up.
The foremost coffin was turning, deviating from its intended course. And ahead of the coffin group was a door frame without its door panels!
Within that door frame, he could faintly see enormous obelisks!
Extremely smooth, like countless flawless mirrors—obelisks!
A forest of giant steles stood in the world behind the door.
Those obelisks reflected the void, reflecting the coffin group drifting past the door. Vaguely, Qin Mu even saw that on the surface of the obelisks, the contents of the coffins were reflected!
These coffins were filled with Dao blood, in which were soaked hairy, monstrous creatures, like corpses or zombies, with long teeth and sharp claws, frantically scratching at the coffin walls!
The corpses of these prehistoric Dao achievers, soaked in the Dao blood within the coffins, had transformed into strange, eerie life forms!
Qin Mu was startled, but gradually calmed down.
These coffins should belong to another faction of Dao achievers besides Miluo Palace and Heavenly Capital City. Their path was different from that of Miluo Palace and Heavenly Capital City.
These Dao achievers were weaker than those of Miluo Palace and Heavenly Capital City, so they carved coffins from World Tree wood and locked themselves inside.
But when the Great Calamity of Birth and Extinction erupted, they used the World Tree coffins to survive the Extinction Calamity but not the Creation Calamity. In the great calamity of cosmic creation, they turned into blood, their corpses soaking in the blood they had become, turning into corpse demons.
"The blood might not be their own. It's more likely they killed other Dao achievers, using their Dao blood as a container, lying in it hoping to survive the Calamity of Birth and Extinction."
Qin Mu grabbed the door panel, leaped up, and ran across the coffins toward the door frame. Beneath his feet, threatening roars came from the coffins, clearly indicating the things inside were restless.
"But after the Calamity of Birth and Extinction, why couldn't they get out?"
Qin Mu blinked and smiled: "Obviously, they went too far. Someone took advantage of the Calamity of Birth and Extinction to seal their coffins, preventing them from escaping after the new universe arrived. Well done!"
His mood improved greatly. He laughed heartily, leaped from the foremost coffin, and landed in the door frame.
In his hand, the door panel whooshed up and snapped into place with the door frame.
Qin Mu looked back. This door panel should have two sides, but now one side was missing from the door frame.
"Where did the other door panel go?"
Qin Mu was puzzled. The treasures refined by the First Young Master of Miluo Palace were certainly of high quality and wouldn't be easily damaged. What had caused both door panels of this portal to detach from the frame?
He stepped forward, trying to remove the door panel, but even with strength surpassing that of Heavenly Emperor Hao, who achieved the Dao through power, he couldn't separate the door panel from the frame!
Qin Mu frowned and released his grip.
"To damage this portal, the force must have come either from outside or from inside! In this universe, there's basically no one stronger than me. Could it be that someone came out from the world behind the door?"
He turned and looked at the world behind the door. Obelisks stood like a forest, towering into the clouds. In the sky hung a sun, burning fiercely and radiating astonishing heat, motionless, unlike other stars with their own orbits.
This was a complete world!
"The door panel flew out of the portal. That means two possibilities: one, something suppressed in the obelisk forest came out and knocked the door panel out from inside. Two, someone from outside grabbed the door panel, tore it off, and threw it away. The second possibility has only a one-third chance, or even less."
Standing before the door, Qin Mu gestured. Breaking this portal from the outside would most conveniently involve directly blasting the door panel into the world behind the door, not pulling it off and throwing it away.
Therefore, the more likely scenario was that someone suppressed here had fought their way out from inside, knocking both door panels flying!
Qin Mu steadied himself and stepped into the world behind the door.
"No matter what the First Young Master suppressed here, I have to venture in!"
His figure disappeared behind the door, walking into the obelisk forest.
Netherworld, a sea of darkness.
Void Lord stood at the center of Heavenly Lake Universe Realm. This universe realm had been completely pulled into the Netherworld by her. The entire realm was covered in bones. Void Lord walked among them, her feet landing on the bones with a crisp crack, crushing countless white bones to powder.
These bones were the beings of Heavenly Lake Universe Realm, including the remains of gods and demons, and even several existences at the Soaring Heaven realm. But when the Heavenly Lake calamity erupted, no matter how powerful these gods and demons were, they died in an instant under Void Lord's divine abilities.
The extinction of the entire universe realm happened in a single breath.
Void Lord looked up at the fragments of the Great Luo Heaven floating around Heavenly Lake Universe Realm. Within each fragment stood an enormous hexagonal pillar, its surface carved with various strange patterns.
Above these hexagonal pillars floated a Dao Fruit each, continuously flowing Dao blood. The Dao blood flowed over the patterns of the hexagonal pillars, activating them.
Above Heavenly Lake Universe Realm, the hexagonal pillars formed a dense Dao chain. The stars and starry sky of the entire Heavenly Lake Universe Realm had been shattered to dust by these Dao chains, transformed into pure energy, and transmitted through the sacrificial altar formed by the hexagonal pillars to the Sixteenth Epoch.
Void Lord remembered that when the Heavenly Lake calamity erupted, she executed all the beings of Heavenly Lake. The next moment, the blood sacrifice began. All the corpses aged rapidly, their flesh and primordial spirits entirely transformed into pure energy absorbed by the altar, quickly turning into bones.
However, this altar devoured Heavenly Lake Universe Realm somewhat more slowly. Even now, it had only just consumed all the stars, constellations, and galaxies of Heavenly Lake Universe Realm.
Now, the Dao chain had reached the main continent of Heavenly Lake Universe Realm. Once this main continent was devoured, the sacrificed energy should be enough to allow a Dao achiever to descend.
Just then, between the Dao chain network, a head slowly emerged.
Void Lord's heart trembled slightly, knowing that the Dao achiever was about to descend!
She quickly left the Heavenly Lake continent, her body tense, ready for any eventuality!
"No need to be nervous."
Heavenly Lord Hao's voice came from behind her: "This is the master of the Spirit Official Hall, one of the seventy-two halls in the Ancestral Court. He's not an outsider!"
——I haven't asked for monthly votes in a few days, and suddenly I noticed that the monthly votes for *The Annals of the Shepherd God* have dropped to twelfth place. Tears streaming! Asking for monthly votes!!