Rise Of The Worm Sovereign

Shirong stood in front of the Fourth Barrier and furrowed his brows.

"Huh… so it took the Immortal Crystal Armament a month to disable just one of the barriers…" Shirong muttered to himself. "No… wait. That's not it, this barrier is stronger than before." He added, after noticing the thickness of the barrier and the complexity of the runes.

'Seems like each layer is different and will take longer for the Immortal Crystal Armament to unravel it.' Shirong thought.

After pensively staring at the barrier for a minute, Shirong shook his head.

"So what if it takes even longer for the Immortal Crystal Armament to unravel the next layer? I got plenty of time!" Shirong said with determination.

"But… there are more places to explore at least." Shirong said while looking to his right and left.

Since the layers of the barriers were set up in a circular shape, one could go around it freely once they entered it. And Shirong was in the third layer, right where the corpse of Ji Quan was located, albeit a bit far from where Shirong was.

Shirong looked to the right and then to the left, before finally deciding to go right.

"Ah, I thought he would go to the left. Never mind, I'll let him explore for a bit while I read the information analyzed by the system." Lin Wu decided.

And so, Shirong spent over ten hours checking out all the ruined courtyards on the right side of the ruins. He was curious about the scrolls and paintings in there as well and wondered if there were useful items in there.

But eventually, he gave up after nothing of importance was found. He kept on going and circled around to the left side, where the corpse of Ji Quan was located.

"Ah, finally he went in the right direction!" Lin Wu said upon noticing where Shirong was.

Two hours later, Shirong made his way to the location where Ji Quan's corpse was located, or more accurately, the blocked entrance. Lin Wu had intentionally made it look a bit suspicious and Shirong caught on to it as well.

"What's this?" Shirong muttered.

His spirit sense probed the rock and went below it, only to find the entrance to the lower area.

"Huh? A basement?" Shirong said upon his discovery.

~Boom~

He lifted the Immortal Crystal Armament and slammed it on the boulder, blocking the entrance, shattering it as if it were chalk. 

~scatter~

The pieces of the boulder scattered all around and the entrance was finally revealed to the man. He furrowed his brows and waved his hands to produce a few orbs of light around him. They floated around him as he walked further into the basement.

But once he reached the bottom, his eyes went wide.

"FIFTH UNCLE!" Shirong yelled, nervousness apparent in his voice.

While he had already known that his Fifth uncle was dead, he had not expected to truly find his dead body. He had mostly thought that his dead body would have been destroyed /eaten /burned or the n-number of things that happened to cultivators that died out in the wild.

But what was more surprising to him was that the body of Ji Quan was whole and undamaged. No injuries could be seen on his body and neither were there any signs of decomposition, which was not that unusual as the body of a Nascent Soul realm cultivator that died before his longevity was over could maintain it for over many years.

Plus, Ji Quan wasn't originally a Nascent Soul realm cultivator either, he was a Dao Shell realm cultivator! 

The only thing was that he had damaged his foundation due to an injury sustained during his youth and ended up with a weakened cultivation base. Despite that, he was still at the Adult Stage of the Nascent Soul realm.

"Who… no, what did this?" Shirong questioned, seeing the stage of his uncle's body. 

He let his gaze wander and saw the other corpses, some of which were intact while some that were mere skeletons. Seeing the different ways that these people had died, a few hypotheses appeared in his mind.

"No, I need to get more information…" Shirong said while shaking his head.

He first put the body of his uncle in the spatial storage ring and then went to check up on the rest of the corpses. He took his fair time in checking the corpses in detail, not letting out even a little chance of mistake.

After two hours, Shirong was finally done and had a tense expression on his face.

"Spirit Qi depletion? In a place like this… it can't be done normally and will need a very unique technique or formation to do so. Hmm… there are no traces of formation around here; that leaves a Qi skill or maybe even a cultivation technique." Shirong analyzed.

Lin Wu who had been observing him from the start, was rather impressed.

"He actually managed to reach the same conclusion as the system." Lin Wu muttered as he continued to observe the man. 'Wonder how long he'll take to check the locked room.'

Just as Lin Wu thought of this, the man looked at the depths of the underground hall and waved his hand, sending out the orbs of light to the ends. The light spread around, revealing the multiple rooms that were located here.

Six of the rooms were already opened, but a single one was closed. Shirong gazed at the empty rooms but did not pay much attention. He had already seen the other ruined courtyards and thought that this was the same.

But when he got to the locked room, his opinion changed. 

"Huh? Spirit Qi?" Shirong said upon sensing a very faint spirit Qi wisp.

This was intentionally made by Lin Wu as he had left a small hole in the door. It let out the spirit Qi contained within the room and allowed Shirong to sense it. 

~whoosh~

Shirong pushed with his hand and wind attribute spirit Qi swirled bound it. The spirit Qi formed into a gale that then pushed through the locked door.