Chapter 573: Unusual Activity
Duan De was stunned. A breeze blew, and he felt a chill all over. After realizing the situation, he let out a heart-wrenching howl, screaming loudly.
He had been stripped clean, making his vision go dark. He staggered, nearly falling flat on his face, then let out a sound like a wolf's howl, wailing miserably, unable to believe this fact.
At this moment, aside from a pair of shorts, he had nothing left on him. Even his Lightning Boots had been taken by the barbarian and worn on his own feet.
"Unscrupulous Heavenly Venerable... your uncle's!" Duan De was furious, spinning around eight times on the spot, then jumping nine times, almost spitting out blood.
He was completely losing his mind. Thirty years of hard work, and in one morning he was stripped bare. His entire collection of treasures, numerous King-level divine weapons, were all gone. They hadn't even left him his pants.
In the primitive mountain range a few miles away, Ye Fan stood on a peak, watching. Seeing this scene, he couldn't help but laugh.
The barbarian also chuckled foolishly, muttering to himself, "Serves you right. Who told you to always scheme against me?"
"Bastard, how despicable can you be? You even took my pants, shoes, and socks. Damn it, is there anything you wouldn't take? I'm not done with you!" Duan De stomped his feet, veins bulging on his forehead, cursing repeatedly.
"You even took his socks?" Ye Fan asked Dongfang Ye.
The barbarian scratched his head and said, "They were woven from Heavenly Silkworm Silk, impervious to water and fire. I just put on the shoes and socks together."
Ye Fan: "..."
He guessed that if Yu Die hadn't been present at the time, Duan De wouldn't even have his shorts left, because those were also woven from Heavenly Silkworm Silk.
"Ahhhh..." Duan De kept shouting, like a chicken being slaughtered or a duck being killed. He was truly going mad. Not a single treasure remained. He wished he could just smash his head into the ground.
"Smoke! He's actually smoking!" the barbarian pointed ahead.
Sure enough, white smoke was pouring out of Duan De's nose, ears, and mouth. To be precise, it was his innate primordial energy, or one could understand it as a surge of anger. He was so furious that smoke was coming out of all seven orifices.
"He's burning! He's burning!" the barbarian stared ahead.
Duan De's entire body was surging with primordial energy. This was from sheer rage. Divine power overflowed, and he looked like he was on fire. His hair stood on end, making him look like a human torch.
"Thump, thump"...
He was banging his head against a stone wall, filled with regret. At this point, he felt like dying. His entire collection of treasures, worth more than the combined hoards of several Saint Lords, was all gone in an instant.
At this moment, he had only one thought: to bite someone. So many divine objects, all dug out from ancient tombs, had been taken away in one go. This was truly worse than killing him.
Duan De wailed repeatedly. He couldn't take it anymore. He jumped up, rushed toward a mountain, and started running laps around it. If he didn't vent the anger in his heart, he feared he would truly go mad.
"One lap, two laps, three laps..." The barbarian was quite unscrupulous, counting Duan De's laps patiently.
"Ahhh... I'll never rest until you're dead!" Duan De ran a hundred and twenty-seven laps around the mountain in one breath, then slammed his head into the ground, kneeling there and banging it repeatedly.
Ye Fan sat on the peak, resting his chin on his hand, chuckling nonstop. This was the first time he had seen Fatty Duan suffer such a loss. He was always the one scheming against others, but today he was so furious.
Then Duan De started running wildly again, with white smoke streaming from his ears and nose. This time, he ran hundreds of laps without stopping.
"Three hundred fifty-seven... three hundred seventy-two..." the barbarian counted patiently.
In the end, Duan De ran a full four hundred laps before collapsing to the ground, his expression indescribably dejected. He looked like he had eaten a dead child, his face a sickly green.
"I, the Daoist, have been catching geese all my life, but now a goose has pecked out my eyes..." he muttered resentfully.
"This broken cave dwelling only had a single incomplete Immortal Wondrous Tree, nothing else. Damn it, it turned out to be a fake dwelling too. And it cost me so many treasures. I hate this!" Duan De came to the cave entrance and slapped out with his palm, causing the entire stone cliff to shatter with a rumble.
"Someone hit me from behind with a club and then bashed me with a brick from the front. Damn it, isn't that my favorite thing to do?" Duan De gritted his teeth. He hadn't even seen the person's shadow before he passed out. It was truly humiliating.
"My bowl, containing an ancient scripture, engraved with imperial texts, the number one divine object of all time, and it's gone like this... I won't accept this. I want to defy the heavens!" Duan De pounded the ground.
"The bowl contains a universe within, a separate world..." He muttered obsessively, revealing many secrets.
"The ancient scripture is called 'Crossing Tribulation,' seizing the fortune of heaven and earth, surpassing all ages..." He spoke mysteriously, very captivating.
"Could that bowl really contain an ancient scripture? Why is his voice getting lower? I can barely hear him." Dongfang Ye was tempted and moved closer.
"Not good, let's go. This damn fatty is putting on an act. He's probably already sensed someone spying from the shadows." Ye Fan's expression changed.
He grabbed Dongfang Ye and quickly rushed deep into the mountains, trying to retreat silently. But Duan De chased after them like a wisp of smoke.
"This damn fatty's spiritual perception is too sharp!" the barbarian exclaimed in surprise.
"Let's go!" Ye Fan grabbed him, activated the Stride Art, and in an instant turned into a bolt of lightning. With a whoosh, he disappeared over the horizon.
At first, Duan De was grinding his teeth, but then he was completely dumbfounded. His enemy hadn't even left a silhouette behind, leaving him several mountain ranges behind, with no trace left.
In the end, Ye Fan and the others returned to the ancient cave. They stared blankly at the broken bowl and the Treasure-Gathering Basin, studying them for a long time without being able to open them. They were at a loss.
In the distant mountains, Duan De sat cross-legged on an altar, using blood as a guide, muttering incantations. Dark clouds pressed down from the sky, incredibly terrifying.
Threads of blood flowed, and leaden clouds descended to the ground. A vast ancient formation activated, rampaging in all directions, like an ancient king awakening.
Thunder and lightning flashed, blood-colored lightning intertwined. Under the pitch-black sky, it was as if ancient war souls had awakened and returned, emitting terrifying waves like an ocean.
"Boom!"
In the distance, the ancient cave where Ye Fan and the others were shook violently. The broken bowl, as if alive, inhaled the essence of heaven and earth, almost instantly draining the spiritual energy of the entire mountain range.
"Not good. Is this an ancient saint's weapon? It's about to revive!"
"Or even, it might be an Imperial Saint Weapon!"
They quickly retreated. Inside the broken bowl, it seemed like a universe of stars, capable of swallowing the sun and moon. Then it turned into a black hole, devouring everything.
It first swallowed the Treasure-Gathering Basin, then shook violently, emitting a pressure that was unbearable, as if a world-dominating demon lord was crossing over from another realm.
"Boom!"
The broken bowl trembled, instantly collapsing most of the mountain, then shot into the sky, flying rapidly toward the distant horizon.
"It flew away!"
Ye Fan and the others shot into the sky. Outside, the sky was clear and blue, but at the edge of the horizon, dark clouds had gathered, and blood-colored lightning danced, as if opening a demonic land.
They flew over and saw Duan De, with disheveled hair, standing on a blood sacrifice altar, muttering incantations. Dark clouds pressed down above his head.
The unusual phenomenon here naturally attracted the attention of others. Many people appeared and reached for the broken bowl. But Duan De let out a great roar, and the bowl turned into an abyss, instantly devouring over a dozen people, leaving only a mist of blood.
"This guy is truly terrifying!" Ye Fan and the others quietly retreated, not joining the commotion. The broken bowl had been taken back by Duan De; there was no way to snatch it back.
After who knows how long, the dark clouds above the blood sacrifice altar finally dissipated. Duan De's face was pale. He put away the broken bowl and the Treasure-Gathering Basin, then, gritting his teeth, flew away.
"Don't let me find out who you are!" He was furious inside. The people who had hit him from behind with a club and bashed him with a brick must have known him, otherwise they wouldn't have spared his life.
In a pure land filled with the fragrance of flowers and the songs of birds, a spiritual spring gurgled, and the scent of fruit filled the air. Ye Fan and the others ate some spiritual fruits, then said their goodbyes.
"A top-tier Great Power has deduced that the Primordial Beast Kings of this world are about to unite. They might drive hundreds of thousands of exotic beasts to attack human cultivators. You should withdraw early and avoid the storm before coming back," Yu Die warned.
Ye Fan nodded. This news was very important to him. The Immortal Mansion World was about to face a great storm. The arrival of many human cultivators had broken the peace here, provoking the dissatisfaction of the exotic Beast Kings.
Princess Yu Die left the Immortal Mansion World, and the barbarian also found a place to go into seclusion, to refine the Heavenly Demon Lamp, fearing that Duan De would use a secret technique to summon it back.
Ye Fan found a deserted mountain and began to test the power of the Immortal Wondrous Tree, full of anticipation. This tender branch was only a little over half a foot long, with seven jade leaves, flowing with light and color, crystal clear and dripping with luster.
Holding the precious tree, he stood before a cliff and gently brushed it forward. After waiting for a long time, nothing changed. He brushed it again with force, but still, the wind was calm, and the cliff remained unmoved.
"Wasn't it said that a single brush of the Immortal Wondrous Tree could break everything?" He turned it over and over, examining it.
Ye Fan didn't give up. He swung the precious tree again. A hazy, auspicious radiance flowed, and streaks of auspicious light fell onto the cliff, but still, it had no effect at all.
Although it had no effect, each time, the precious tree absorbed all of Ye Fan's divine power, like a bottomless pit that could never be filled.
"It consumes divine power but does nothing?!" He almost threw the precious tree to the ground. If he weren't a Sacred Body, whose divine power was hard to exhaust, he would have collapsed from exhaustion after those few swings.
Ye Fan stubbornly tried again. He continuously channeled divine power, swinging the precious tree, brushing again and again.
After his power was drained forty-nine times, one of the red jade leaves on the Immortal Wondrous Tree finally shimmered with brilliant light, shooting out a streak of crimson glow that landed on the cliff.
"Boom!"
The cliff rumbled loudly. It actually rose from the ground, floating lightly like a fallen leaf, swept away horizontally into the distance.
"It swept a whole mountain away!" Ye Fan was astonished.
Soon after, a shocking piece of news came from ahead. Over a dozen powerful experts had ventured deep into the Primordial World, but only one Half-Step Great Power escaped. However, he had gone mad, constantly muttering the words "Immortal Emperor" under his breath.
Moreover, someone had heard earth-shaking battle cries from deep within the Immortal Mansion World, as if hundreds of thousands of troops were charging. The sky and earth were dark, and it seemed that saints were participating in the great battle, blocking the path ahead, making it impossible to approach.
"Let's go quickly. The Primordial Beast Kings are about to launch an attack. Hundreds of thousands of exotic beasts are going to slaughter human cultivators..."
Many people had received the news. They didn't care about the secrets deep within the Immortal Mansion World. Avoiding this immediate catastrophe was the most important thing. The exotic beasts were about to riot.