Translator: BornToBe

  The blood-colored pool stretched as far as he could see. When Long Chen approached it, he was shocked to find that this lake wasn’t filled with water but was truly formed of blood. Furthermore, it was the terrifying essence blood.

  The powerful fluctuations coming from the lake gave Long Chen chills. This kind of power was something he had only sensed from the Alldevil monster’s essence blood.

  Dense mist swirled out of the lake so that he couldn’t see far; however, he saw floating logs on the lake that formed a strange bridge.

  This bridge was not steady. There were many random logs in constant motion, and it seemed he was supposed to jump across them to reach the other side. That was very dangerous.

  Eventually, Qu Jianying stepped forward to try it on her own. Even after a long time, she didn’t see anyone else come to try it.

  Qu Jianying jumped onto one of the logs, and it rocked in the water. There was danger of falling in at any moment.

  Long Chen guessed that there was no way to fly in this region, or Qu Jianying would have just flown right there.

  As he looked deeper into the mist, the water suddenly surged. A strange lifeform jumped out of the water and at Qu Jianying.

  It was a humanoid with a fish tail and eight horns on its head. It opened a huge mouth full of sinister teeth as it tried to bite Qu Jianying.

  Qu Jianying slashed with a sword. However, it wasn’t a true sword but one condensed of her Yuan Spirit energy. She killed the creature in one attack.

  As soon as she killed it, the surface of the lake exploded. Countless other blood-colored creatures charged at her.

  Qu Jianying quickly retreated to the shore where the creatures were unable to cross. After a few furious roars, they unwillingly retreated.

  “Damn, what are these? How could they be so terrifying? Furthermore, that resentment coming from them, they don’t seem like a real species. They’re quite similar to the resentful spirits in stories.”


  Qu Jianying didn’t dare to touch this lake water. It was too strange. As for those monsters, although they weren’t very powerful, at the end, they had come at her in such terrifying numbers that it was all too possible to end up falling into the water.

  Qu Jianying didn’t dare to try it again. She found a place to hide herself by the shore.

  After an unknown amount of time, someone finally appeared. It was a humanoid, but his body was small. He was like a dwarf and was only three feet tall.

  He looked at the lake for a long time. It was unknown whether or not Qu Jianying had used some secret art to conceal herself, but he didn’t notice her.

  After examining the blood lake carefully, he slowly touched the surface of it and immediately let out a shrill scream.

  The finger he had used to touch the lake had turned to mist, and that mist continued to burn away the rest of his body. His hand instantly vanished. The speed at which it spread was shocking.

  The dwarf immediately cut off his arm at the shoulder. By that time, his arm up to his elbow had vanished.

  Less than half a breath’s time after his arm landed on the ground, it vanished into mist. The elder’s face was pale.

  All he had done was touch the lake, but if he hadn’t been decisive enough, he would have died.

  He stopped by the shore for a long time. His arm slowly recovered. Only then did he slowly jump onto one of the floating logs and continue onward.

  At first, things went very smoothly, and he advanced several miles. Just as he was about to vanish into the mist, one of the fish monsters inside the lake attacked him.

  Just like Qu Jianying, the dwarf easily killed it. Based on its attack speed, power, and spatial fluctuations, Long Chen estimated it to be around the power of a Soul Transformation expert.

  To an expert on Qu Jianying’s level, such a creature could be slain with the wave of a hand. However, right after the dwarf killed it, countless more of them suddenly sprang out of the lake, attacking him.

  Although the dwarf killed as many as he could, there were too many, and they filled the air.

  However, Long Chen noticed one secret. These monsters never touched the floating logs no matter what attack they used.

  The dwarf was fighting with all his power and wanted to retreat. However, he had gone too deep, and his path was blocked. Just at this moment, a tentacle wrapped around his ankle.

  He was instantly pulled underwater. A miserable cry rang out for just an instant before it disappeared. The lake returned to calm.

  Long Chen could feel himself sweating. Fortunately, Qu Jianying had been lucky. She had been attacked just after jumping onto the logs and had time to retreat. If she had been in the dwarf’s position, she would probably have died.

  This lake was too terrifying. Even someone as strong as Qu Jianying was miniscule in front of it.

  No wonder it was said that advancing to the Netherpassage realm was an incomparably dangerous venture. This place was filled with danger.

  The image he saw stayed still for a long time. Long Chen guessed that Qu Jianying was waiting for someone else to test this place.

  However, in the end, no one else came, and Qu Jianying moved. She once more jumped onto a floating log and continued advancing.

  Although he knew that Qu Jianying had managed to pass and advance to the Netherpassage realm, watching what she had gone through still gave Long Chen chills.

  Eventually, Qu Jianying was so deep into the mist that when she looked back, she couldn’t see the shore. Everything around her was mist. Long Chen couldn’t help sighing inside. The path of experts was always so difficult. There were no shortcuts, and they had to face death.

  Even someone as strong as Qu Jianying seemed so weak in the face of the ephemeral existence known as fate. However, she still chose to advance.

  Eventually, one of those monsters appeared and attacked her. This time, she didn’t strike back. Instead, a runic barrier appeared around her.

  She stayed motionless as the monster tore at her barrier. It was unknown what kind of special ability it had, but her barrier began to crack.

  However, Qu Jianying was not taken by surprise. She slowly passed more energy into her barrier. As long as it was just one, these monsters were unable to harm her.

  The monster bit and tore at her barrier for a long time without drawing more monsters. Long Chen suddenly realized that as long as these monsters weren’t attacked, it was possible to pass safely.

  As expected, after blocking the first one, she didn’t draw more. As she advanced, ripples began to appear on the calm lake.

  As the surface of the lake rose, Long Chen saw some splashing. Eventually, he saw the mouth of a spring from which the blood water was flowing out. There was a stone tablet there with three crooked words. They didn’t seem like immortal characters. In any case, Long Chen didn’t recognize them.

  “Yellow Springs Path.”


  “What? Doesn’t the Yellow Springs Path only exist in folklore? Plus, shouldn’t it be yellow?” asked Long Chen.

  “I don’t know either. I just recognize those three characters. That damn Yun Shang, return my memories!” raged Evilmoon. It was more and more sure that Yun Shang had taken away a portion of its memories.

  Alright, perhaps the Yellow Springs weren’t yellow. Among the common folk, there was a saying to stop digging if you struck yellow water when digging a well, because that well would lead to the land of the dead.

  But wasn’t that just nonsense? The soil people lived on was yellow. It was only natural that when the first water came out, it would be yellow. If that saying was true, wouldn’t there be no wells?

  That was why this saying was not trustworthy at all and was mostly only told during stories. However, now that Evilmoon had said what those characters were, Long Chen’s heart thumped. For some reason, he felt a chill.

  Qu Jianying continued to advance. There was no way to sense the flow of time here, but eventually she reached a giant whirlpool.

  Now Long Chen saw an even more shocking scene. There were nine lakes, all different colors.

  Red, orange, yellow, green, azure, blue, violet, white, and black lake water was gathering here, forming a gigantic whirlpool.

  “This is the legendary Nine Springs? Below the Nine Springs is the land of the dead?” Long Chen’s hair stood on end. Were the stories told by the common people actually true?

  If they were, what of the Ox-Head and Horse-Face guardians of the underworld? What of the Black and White Deities of the Dead? What of the Asuras of Purgatory?

  Long Chen felt like he couldn’t accept this. Having cultivated to this point, he now saw things on his cultivation path that were only spoken of in stories by the weakest commoners of the land.

  Qu Jianying paused where the nine springs gathered. The water was flowing, but the wooden logs didn’t move. The strange monsters of the lake had also vanished.

  Long Chen carefully examined the nine springs. He felt like he was close to grasping some kind of mysterious element to them, but then that feeling vanished.

  “These nine springs are definitely hiding some kind of secret.” Long Chen was sure about this. This was a kind of intuition that he felt very clearly.

  Regretfully, all he was seeing was some memories. Many things could not be transmitted through just the five senses. He was also only able to experience it as Qu Jianying had experienced it.

  Qu Jianying continued forward. A straight set of stairs appeared descending into the center of the whirlpool.

  When Qu Jianying reached the bottom, Long Chen saw that the waterfall of lake water was actually flowing in reverse here, forming a strange cycle.

  Continuing on the path, he suddenly saw a giant gate. This gate also had three characters on it.

  “Gates of Hell.”


  Evilmoon recognized them again. What it said caused Long Chen’s heart to pound.