Mahayana 123
BGM: Wuthering Waves - Unwritten In The Stars
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Chapter 123: The Immortal Palace Lies Just Ahead – The Netherwold Court
TL : Cnine
ED/PF :
Part 1
About an incense stick later, Xiao Yifeng stood up, stretched a little, and grinned. “Thanks for the bodyguard service, Fairy Mo.”
“Fellow daoist Wu Chen, there’s no need to be so polite. After all, you and I are friends,” Mo Shuiyao said with a smile.
The two of them continued flying towards the edge of Wraithwood Village atop Xiao Bing, each harbouring their own hidden intentions and remaining wary of the other.
Just as Xiao Yifeng had predicted, not long after forcing their way through the village, they finally broke free of Wraithwood Village and emerged onto a bleak, desolate plain.
Neither of them paused for even a moment, pressing on and flying deeper into the wasteland.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Su Miaoqing led Lin Xiao along the outskirts of Wraithwood Village. She had intended to follow Xiao Yifeng’s instructions, circling the perimeter until they found a way out.
After walking for a while, Su Miaoqing suddenly stopped, brows furrowed as if something had occurred to her. Lin Xiao found this strange, but he stopped as well, waiting for her to speak.
“Can you tell that the mist isn’t uniform?” Su Miaoqing asked, brows knitting. “Do you see a strand of golden light leading deeper in?”
Lin Xiao scanned the surroundings, confusion flickering across his face. “I see nothing but fog,” he said. “No difference in weight. No golden light.”
Su Miaoqing fell silent. In her vision, the forest breathed differently. Some mist pressed down like a burden, while other strands drifted lightly. Within the lighter haze, a river of golden radiance pulsed with faint starlight, threading its way into the heart of the woods.
“If a golden path reveals itself only to you,” Lin Xiao said, eyes sharpening, “Then perhaps this immortal estate has chosen you. Fate does not show its hand without reason.”
Su Miaoqing weighed the moment. Fear flickered, then steadied. With Lin Xiao beside her, danger could be pushed forward. And the Coiling Dragon Jade Pendant rested reassuringly against her chest.
She exhaled softly and stepped into the light, letting destiny draw her onward.
Elsewhere, Luo Yun and his companion, their cultivation firmly suppressed, struggled through hardship after hardship before finally making it past Golden Rooster Mountain and setting foot in Wraithwood Village.
“That Golden Rooster Mountain was clearly cleared out by someone earlier,” Liu Yue said gravely. “There were barely any dangerous demonic beasts left. The others must already be far ahead.”
Despite his words, there was no trace of impatience in his heart. At this point, the Immortal Palace’s treasures meant little to him. His sole priority was getting Luo Yun out alive.
“They must possess the stone stele,” Luo Yun said thoughtfully. “Only then could they avoid the mansion’s suppression and move so quickly.”
Luck was on their side. They encountered no swarms of wraiths. Unaware of the forest’s hidden rules, the two marched straight towards the heart of Wraithwood Village.
Yet before long, an unsettling realisation dawned on them. The village looked as though someone had only just torn through it moments ago.
The two exchanged a glance and both saw the surprise in the other’s eyes. Clearly, they had run into someone else.
They concealed their auras and quietly flew along the trail of destruction that had been left behind. Before long, the sounds of battle reached their ears, accompanied by the rising and falling wails of wraiths.
Ahead lay a vast Wraithwood Village, where swarms of vicious wraiths were besieging a single man. He wielded a massive pair of hooked blades, yet despite facing the encirclement of countless wraiths, he showed not the slightest trace of panic.
With every sweep and twist of his twin hooks, one powerful wraith inevitably fell. It was as though he himself were the true soul-reaping demon. A formidable aura radiated from his body, and within Wraithwood Village, he moved as if through empty ground.
Both Luo Yun and his companion wore looks of shock. The man slaughtering wraiths with such abandon was none other than Old Demon King.
Moreover, the aura he was emitting was not that of a mid-stage Golden Core cultivator, but peak level Golden Core realm, already one foot into the Nascent Soul realm.
The two of them instinctively concealed their auras even further. They had never imagined that among their group, there would be a peak level Golden Core realm expert lying in wait.
“I never expected that the Old Demon King have been hiding his cultivation all along. Our group truly is full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers,” Liu Yue transmitted with a bitter smile.
A faint glint of cold light flickered in Luo Yun’s beautiful eyes as she pondered something silently.
Moments later, she transmitted, “Fellow daoist Liu, why don’t we quietly follow behind him? After he breaks through, Wraithwood Village won’t be able to regroup so quickly. We can slip through unnoticed.”
Liu Yue nodded in agreement. The two immediately went into hiding, keeping a close watch on Old Demon King.
Meanwhile, Xiao Yifeng and Mo Shuiyao flew at top speed across the desolate plain, both maintaining a guarded vigilance against one another.
“Is that the Immortal Palace?” Mo Shuiyao suddenly asked, a brilliant light shimmering in her beautiful eyes.
In the distance, a vast and magnificent palace floated in mid-air, grand beyond compare, radiating a gentle divine glow.
At the very top of the palace stood a towering, razor-sharp spire, crowned by an enormous orb emitting a blue radiance. Around the palace, several colossal celestial stairways linked the structure to the ground below.
Xiao Yifeng and Mo Shuiyao increased their speed, flying towards the palace. Only when they drew closer did they realise that the palace was suspended above an enormous circular chasm.
The chasm revealed no bottom at all. Four massive chains were fastened around the palace, each extending down into the depths of the chasm.
It was as if the palace wanted to soar into the sky, but these chains kept it firmly tethered. Below the bottomless abyss, countless grotesque and fearsome wraiths writhed, their howls echoing as they clawed desperately at the chains or the rocky walls of the chasm.
These innumerable wraiths tried to climb towards the palace—or even reach the surface—but halfway up, the massive orb atop the palace would unleash bolts of lightning that either struck them down or hurled them back into the chasm.
From a distance, it looked as if the palace were sealed in place, suppressing the throngs of wraiths beneath. The sheer number of fiends writhing at its base was enough to make anyone’s scalp tingle.
The palace boasted ten colossal celestial stairways, stretching from the palace down to the edge of the circular chasm. Each of these stairways had hundreds of steps; Xiao Yifeng, having walked one, knew there were precisely nine hundred and ninety-nine steps.
Each stairway led to a giant palace gate. The one facing them had a plaque with the characters “Qin Guang” inscribed upon it.
The palace loomed impossibly vast, its entirety shrouded in jet-black stone. Every surface writhed with grotesque carvings of countless malicious spirits, each one frozen mid-scream in eternal torment. Its base was square, adorned with four massive chains that anchored it to the abyss below, yet the palace itself formed a perfect circle—surely a nod to the ancient “Heaven is round, Earth is square” philosophy.
From the ten colossal stairways stretching skyward, it was clear that the palace held ten grand gates. At the pinnacle sat a monstrous trident, above which hovered an enormous blue orb of energy. From this orb, thunderous lightning bolts surged forth, driving back the throngs of malicious spirits that dared ascend.
“Fellow daoist Wu Chen, do you happen to know anything about this palace? Could you… Perhaps tell me a little?” Mo Shuiyao’s eyes sparkled with curiosity, almost like twin sapphires reflecting the lightning above.
Xiao Yifeng gave her a faint, teasing smirk and replied, “I cannot. Should we... Part ways here instead?”
Mo Shuiyao gasped dramatically, hands clasped to her chest. “Fellow daoist Wu Chen, how could you be so heartless! After all we’ve been through together, risking life and limb—this is positively cruel. You wound me so!”
Xiao Yifeng rolled his eyes at the drama queen antics and decided he had better things to do. He swept his gaze across the dizzying chasm, gauging his path, and launched himself skyward, skimming the jagged edge of the abyss in a wide arc.
Mo Shuiyao’s face instantly blossomed with a radiant smile, and without a moment’s pause, she flitted after him, as if drawn by some magnetic force.
They spiralled halfway around the gargantuan chasm, squandering a fair chunk of time, until Xiao Yifeng finally caught sight of a solitary black stone stele.
The stone was ominous and commanding: Netherwold Court, with a tiny inscription in the corner: Ten Kings of Hell, Overseeing the Eighteen Layers of the Netherworld. Ahead, the palace gate loomed, its celestial ladder leading upward, crowned with the words Rotation.
Xiao Yifeng’s lips curled into a triumphant grin as he shot toward the stele. Mo Shuiyao, clearly unwilling to be outdone, darted after him with the speed of a determined cat burglar, evidently keen on snatching it for herself.
“Fairy Mo, are you trying to betray me now, revealing your dagger at the end of the scheme?” Xiao Yifeng sneered.
“Fellow daoist Wu Chen, that’s a terrible accusation! You’ve already collected a lot of steles, surely this one can belong to Yao Yao.”
Despite the sorrow painted on her face, her hands betrayed no hesitation. The Moon Blade arced around her like liquid silver, lashing out at Xiao Yifeng with deadly precision.
Xiao Yifeng cursed under his breath, quickly turning and intercepting the attack with his sword held across his chest.