A World Worth Protecting

The incense burner on the Immortal Platform appeared plain and ancient. There were nine enormous inscriptions written on it. They didn’t understand what the inscriptions meant, but they could sense the immense power exuding from them.

When Wang Baole lifted his right hand and placed it on the incense burner, a powerful suction erupted suddenly and yanked at Wang Baole’s physical body. It hooked onto his cultivation easily and drew it into the Immortal Platform!

The entire process was out of Wang Baole’s control. His Spirit Qi seemed to have wrestled loose, like a horse shrugging off its reins. It sped towards the Immortal Platform, and one of the inscriptions began to glow with a dim light.

A myriad of emotions flashed across Zhao Yameng’s and Zhuo Yifan’s faces. They approached immediately and pressed their palms onto the Immortal Platform. Streams of Spirit Qi flowed out of their bodies instantly, surging into the incense burner. The glowing inscription began to shine with a brighter intensity.

Even though there were three of them, two at the Core Formation realm and one at the Foundation Establishment realm, they were unable to satisfy the first inscription’s need for Spirit Qi. Wang Baole was prepared for this, though. Once he sensed Zhuo Yifan’s weakening, he pulled out three supreme-grade Spirit Stones and flung one at Zhao Yameng and Zhuo Yifan. He held the remaining Spirit Stone in his left hand and allowed the Spirit Qi in the stone to flow into his body.

Time passed steadily. Despite their pale faces and trembling bodies, they managed to reach a certain sort of balance while being sustained by supreme-grade Spirit Stones. After exhausting hundreds of Spirit Stones, the first inscription on the incense pot finally lit up completely.

A sudden immense force surged from the Immortal Platform as the inscription lit up, blocking off the suction force. The three of them stumbled back as their bodies shuddered.

At that exact moment, the blinding light from the first inscription spread out. The entire incense burner began to quake. It finally activated for the first time in decades!

Loud booms like thunder descended and nearly deafened them. A wisp of green smoke rose slowly from the incense burner towards the skies.

It was a strange sight indeed. Wang Baole said immediately, “Use the mantra I’ve taught you and enter the green smoke!”

Little Missy had taught Wang Baole a mantra during the ten day’s journey. It was a simple manta that resembled a string of code. Zhao Yameng and Zhuo Yifan had memorized it easily after he had taught them. As soon as Wang Baole said that, they immediately formed a series of hand seals. Their motions were fully synchronized. As they uttered the mantra in their heads, they began to shine with a green light. It grew brighter and brighter until their forms were completely obscured by the light. They had transformed into spheres of glowing green light.

As the glowing spheres continued to shine, they began to rise slowly into the air and race towards the enormous incense burner. They headed for the green smoke rising above the incense burner, approaching and merging with it. One could then see three indistinct figures in the green smoke—Wang Baole, Zhao Yameng, and Zhuo Yifan.

Before they could recover from their shock, the green smoke rose rapidly away, drifting off in the windless sky. It sped into the distance, disregarding any mountain peaks or seas of fire in its way. It passed straight through them. It was swift, swifter than the three of them had ever been. Such a means of travel, via smoke, was beyond their wildest imagination. They couldn’t control the surge of emotions inside of them.

“This is what the true Vast Expanse Dao Palace is like…” Zhuo Yifan muttered to himself. Zhao Yameng began to analyze what was going on. She was clearly taken aback, but her mind instinctively tried to dissect the principles behind the Immortal Platform.

Wang Baole was the only one whose eyes were shining. If he could make good use of the Immortal Platform, he might… just be able to enter any hexed areas and search for treasures.

They each had their own thoughts, but the shock of traveling via smoke remained. The speed was astonishing. Wang Baole’s preliminary assessment indicated that the smoke was traveling at a hundred times his speed. They stared at the lands beneath them as they traveled, unable to recover from the shock of it all.

They had the rare opportunity to view a large segment of the sword body as they sped through the air. They saw that the Sea of Fire covered only half of the lands, while the remaining half was covered in different types of landscape.

They saw hundreds of deep craters, many which weren’t filled with lava. And even those that were weren’t filled to the brim. A terrifying aura that struck fear into their hearts oozed from deep inside each of those craters.

They saw signs of spells being cast. The energy signatures of spells could be found in some regions. The danger that oozed from those regions remained intense despite them being protected in the smoke.

Those sights could hardly compare to what they saw next. As they raced in the skies, a giant hand emerged from the Sea of Fire below them. It looked different from the giant hand they had encountered before, having only four fingers. It swept through the air and made a grab for the smoke they were nestled in. The giant hand charged towards the shocked trio, but it missed. It was as if the entire cloud of smoke was just that—a cloud of smoke. It dispersed, then gathered together again, then continued dashing through the sky.

The harmless fright sent their hearts racing as they released a sigh of relief. They watched as they flew across the lands. Gradually, a vast plain appeared before them. On it were countless… skeletons!

“This… this…” Wang Baole’s eyes almost popped out. His breathing quickened as he stared stupidly at the plain below them. It was a vast plain, without an end in sight, and innumerable skeletons filled the plains, too many for counting.

There were cultivators from the Vast Expanse Dao Palace as well as members of the Never-Ending Clan. It was clear that a large-scale battle between the two had been conducted here. Death filled the air, and pockets of chaos littered the place. Those with inadequate levels of cultivation might go mad instantly should they even draw near this place.

However, if one could enter this place safely, he would be rewarded with a bountiful gain. He would walk away filthy rich. In fact, the battle credits that one would get from the sheer number of identity tokens found there was unimaginable, not to mention the treasures that rested in countless storage bags on the battlefield…

“My god!” Wang Baole had thought he had come away with quite a bounty. He knew now that what he had found was a mere grain of sand in an ocean. It was pathetic.

The sight made them realize how impossible it would be for them to return if they hadn’t found the Immortal Platform!

The green smoke traveled for three days. It crossed vast lands, none of which seemed familiar to them. Then, they came across an extremely unique sea!

It was not a Sea of Fire, but one of blood. The sea of blood rested within a Sea of Fire. Its edges were clearly defined. The flames couldn’t cross and mingle. When the green smoke flew past, it began to warp and grow thinner. It sank, gradually. It seemed affected by the sea of blood and was on the verge of disintegration. The three of them began to grow nervous. As they looked down, Zhao Yameng suddenly said, “There’s a corpse in the sea of blood!”

A corpse floated adrift in the sea of blood. It wasn’t extremely large, but it was still considerably taller than an ordinary man. It was about twenty feet long and was dressed in lavish attire. It also only had half its skull on it.

If they hadn’t had such good eyes, due to the descending mist, they wouldn’t have been able to spot it.

Even though the corpse was missing half its skull, and even though it was dead, it continued to exude an overpowering aura which affected the green smoke. He was clearly the cause of the sea of blood, having been able to create such a terrifying phenomenon after his death. This was the most terrifying sight that the three of them had seen while traveling in the green smoke!

His cultivation must at least be at the Eternal Star realm when he was still alive! He might be even more powerful than that! Based on his experiences in the Dark Dream, Wang Baole did a rough estimation. He reeled back with shock—at the corpse’s power and at the mark on the corpse’s arm. Others might not know what it signified, but Wang Baole had read about such things while he was in the Dark Dream. He had read that extremely powerful cultivators were able to form storage seals and create an alternate space inside their bodies, where they could store their possessions more safely.

This person should be an Elder! That’s two hundred thousand battle credits!