Chapter 182: What Is This?

Dongbo Xueying and Chi Qiu Bai both hovered in midair. The ruined castle was still extremely heavy; if Dongbo Xueying had to lift it by his own strength alone, he truly wouldn’t have been able to. However, by manipulating the power of heaven and earth, Dongbo Xueying did so effortlessly, causing all objects to rise into the air.

“Brother Changfeng, I feel that the items within this ruined castle are all quite ordinary. Have you noticed anything unusual?” Dongbo Xueying carefully examined the surroundings, using the power of heaven and earth to inspect every single bound object.

“Nothing found,” Chi Qiu Bai also shook his head in confusion.

“Whoosh!”

At Dongbo Xueying’s mental command, countless objects immediately flew sideways and far away, landing on a vast stretch of barren land. Fragments of stone pillars, stone slabs, and such were all piled together, forming a small hill. Corpses and remains were gathered in another pile, while paper, books, plates, and other items were also stacked together elsewhere.

“Sorted out separately? This will make it much easier for Longshan Pavilion to investigate later,” Chi Qiu Bai smiled.

“Just a small favor,” Dongbo Xueying replied. “I’ll now unearth all the secret chambers beneath the ground. There are still arrays and artifacts below.” As he spoke, he manipulated the power of heaven and earth to dig even deeper, hollowing out every trace of artificial construction. The array previously used to confront Dongbo Xueying was also unearthed.

Countless objects soared into the air once more.

Precious items were casually collected by Dongbo Xueying, while the rest continued to land on the distant wasteland.

“Earlier, the Demon God Wu Yunhuo promised me one hundred thousand jin of Yuan stones. The treasure must be worth no less than that,” Dongbo Xueying said. “Yet we still haven’t found it. It’s hidden quite well, probably protected by some concealed magical formation. It might take some time to locate.”

“I suspect there’s a formation concealing it too,” Chi Qiu Bai agreed.

Magical formations serve various purposes.

There are formations for killing, confusion, imprisonment, and concealment—each capable of evading detection by the power of heaven and earth.

“Such a formation was used to hide it—hmm, it must indeed be a rare treasure,” Chi Qiu Bai smiled. “Alright, let’s go with our usual method—start with brute force.”

“Agreed.” Dongbo Xueying willed again, and the vast power of heaven and earth began to dig up everything around—soil, rocks, and anything else.

Nothing was spared!

Soil and rocks flew into the air, piling up in another area of the wasteland, quickly forming a mound of earth and stone. As the ground where the castle once stood sank deeper and deeper, the distant mound grew taller and taller.

Moments later, the once-magnificent castle site had transformed into a massive pit three hundred meters deep.

“Strange, we’ve completely swept through every area, yet still haven’t found anything,” Chi Qiu Bai remarked. “And we’ve been watching closely with our own eyes, seeing nothing unusual. It must also be distorting light.”

Human vision relies on light.

If one could manipulate light, they could achieve invisibility. Clearly, this formation also possessed concealment abilities.

“I guess I’ll have to work harder and personally inspect every spot,” Dongbo Xueying said, and immediately dove downward.

Whoosh—

Dongbo Xueying’s speed surged, flying rapidly within the massive pit three hundred meters deep, zipping around and touching everything with his body!

Physical contact was the simplest yet hardest method of detecting a formation.

If it were a maze-type formation? Once it caused disorientation, one would immediately realize they had entered a formation! Some concealment arrays could make things invisible to the eye and undetectable by the power of heaven and earth. However, making physical contact undetectable was extremely difficult.

“Boom!”

Flying with a mass of afterimages, he finally collided with something with a loud thud.

“It’s right here!” Dongbo Xueying smiled. “I thought it would be really impressive, that it could twist space and let me fly past without noticing.”

Physical contact.

To prevent someone from even touching the formation was extremely difficult! Maze-type formations might prevent contact, but they would immediately trigger awareness. To avoid contact without detection… would require completely hiding the spatial location of the formation itself. That would demand perfect manipulation of space, and sustained manipulation at that—something human demigods couldn’t achieve.

Like in the Xihuo Palace, with the help of the Xihuo Palace space artifact, such a feat was possible.

But for a Demon God, even delivering some resources into the Xia Clan’s world was extremely difficult. Delivering a treasure like the Xihuo Palace? The cost would be too high! It wouldn’t be worth it for just a small amount of faith. Only the Xia Clan ancestors, who held boundless affection for their homeland, were willing to pay such a great price to return treasures to their homeland.

Thus, the Xia Clan’s foundation—their powerful clan treasures, divine weapons, and even sacred artifacts—many of them carried the deep emotions of the Xia Clan ancestors for their homeland.

“Sustained spatial distortion? Such a formation must be something even a Demon God would hesitate to use,” Chi Qiu Bai flew over and reached out, touching the barrier of the formation.

“Obstruction?” Chi Qiu Bai sneered.

On his right hand was a faint layer of transcendent battle qi, with spatial cutting intent on the outer layer. After many years of cultivation, his mastery of spatial cutting intent had naturally become even more refined.

With a casual grab!

His fingers were incredibly sharp, slicing through, directly tearing open the formation’s barrier. In truth, the formation’s resistance wasn’t strong; even Dongbo Xueying could have forcibly broken through.

Hua—

The formation was broken.

Before them appeared the real scene.

Within this area stood a rather grotesque large bath, only ten meters in size, entirely pitch black. On one edge of the bath was a massive demon head statue, its eyes glowing red, its mouth wide open, from which faintly exuded a sinister aura.

The bath itself was firmly fixed to the ground, or rather—fixed to the space of this world.

Countless tentacles surrounded the bath, connected to the space. With the fluctuations of the Xia Clan world’s space, the tentacles gently swayed.

At this moment—

Twenty-five humans were hurriedly dismantling the connections between the tentacles and the demon bath. Beside them, the Demon God Wu Yunhuo, wearing a black robe, with red skin and gray curved horns, was even anxiously helping to dismantle the tentacles. Yet each tentacle was fully connected to the world’s space, continuously swaying with the fluctuations, making disassembly extremely difficult.

“Cursed!” The Demon God Wu Yunhuo turned his head, glaring at the black-robed youth and white-haired man who had broken in.

“Just wait, Dongbo Xueying!” Wu Yunhuo growled lowly. With a whoosh, his figure twisted and vanished into thin air.

“What a quick escape, really impressive spatial traversal,” Chi Qiu Bai remarked with admiration.

Dongbo Xueying, on the other hand, curiously observed the massive demon bath before him, while the twenty-five Star Knights were all bound and suppressed to one side.

“What is this?” Dongbo Xueying asked, puzzled. He felt an overwhelming sense of evil radiating from the demon bath.

“This bath seems to be integrated with our Xia Clan world, and its use of space is extremely bizarre,” Chi Qiu Bai also shook his head. “I can’t identify what it is either.”

Although Chi Qiu Bai was a demigod, his cultivation spanned only over three hundred years, and he had only recently become a demigod, so naturally, his knowledge was limited.

“Shall we consult Vice Overseer Chao?” Chi Qiu Bai asked.

“Good idea.” Dongbo Xueying agreed. Vice Overseer Chao Qing was the eldest demigod among the Xia Clan and likely could identify the origin of this item.

…

Elsewhere.

Deep within a volcano, a strange warship was hidden here.

This warship was frequently used by the Demon General when waging wars outside, and it could also block detection methods like sensing the power of heaven and earth.

Inside the warship, in a cold hall.

A crystal orb floated in midair.

Above the crystal, an image was being displayed—a scene of a black-clothed youth wielding a spear in a furious thrust.

“Darbish is dead, killed by a Xia Clan prodigy named Dongbo Xueying.”

A demon wearing purple armor stood there, his entire body covered in scale-like armor without a single hair.

His armor was beautiful, almost seamlessly integrated with the scales on his body. His golden eyes coldly stared at the image floating above the crystal orb.

This demon was quite small and thin, only about five feet tall, but the endless bloodthirsty aura he exuded made the three fifth-stage demons standing respectfully nearby tremble with fear. They had served under the General in the Abyssal Darkness, working for a Demon God in endless campaigns—the terrifying and evil presence of the General had long instilled fear in them.

“Carry my order,” the thin demon in purple said calmly. “All demons under my command, those below the fifth stage—when encountering Dongbo Xueying, do not engage. Evade if possible, flee at full strength if not!”

“Yes.”

All three subordinates respectfully obeyed, their loyalty to the General absolute.

Suddenly, the crystal orb shimmered again.

A new image appeared on its surface—none other than the Demon God Wu Yunhuo.

“Oh, isn’t this Demon God Wu Yunhuo?” the thin demon in purple smiled.