Chapter 2377

Only see the hall is thirty or forty zhang high, and its area is vast, seeming to be over a thousand mu.

But on the originally smooth blue stone floor, now everywhere is pitted and uneven, scattered with the wreckage of flying knives, flying swords, and other magical artifacts, plus some scorched traces from fire and lightning strikes; at the center lies an enormous beast bone, crystalline like jade, resembling a crocodile yet not, a flood dragon yet not.

It looks as if someone once fought a fierce battle with this strange beast here, but judging by how long these traces have lingered, it must have been quite a long time ago.

Han Li examined the beast bone with some surprise; from the lingering trace of aura on it, he directly deduced that in life it should have been a cultivator of great completion in the Body Integration stage.

Even a mere Body Integration stage giant beast left such intense battle traces—this shows that those who broke into this place certainly had no Nascent Soul cultivators among them, but their cultivation was certainly not too weak either.

From the scattered magical artifact wreckage on the ground, it is clear that the fighters in the fierce battle were certainly not just one person; there should have been four or five.

After Han Li looked for a moment, his gaze suddenly shifted and fell upon a row of wooden racks in the corner of the hall.

This wooden rack is about two or three zhang long, entirely pitch black, holding two rows of over a dozen silver-colored trays of various sizes, but all are empty, as if their contents had long been taken away.

Seeing this, Han Li no longer hesitated; he immediately flickered his form and walked straight toward the exit at the other end of the hall.

The same blue passage continued, winding and ascending.

But this time, Han Li walked for the duration of a meal before finally exiting the passage.

Before his eyes suddenly opened up, revealing a space several times larger than the previous hall.

Above floated a few patches of light white clouds; the ground was paved with fine white sand.

In the center of this space stood a triangular building resembling a temple.

Han Li glanced at the building, flipped his hand once, and a crystalline small bottle appeared.

After scanning it, seeing no special reaction from the bottle, he frowned slightly and then walked toward the already-opened temple gate.

The Wu Ling Three Saints, however, were already standing before a vast black mist sea that stretched beyond sight.

The mist surged like a living thing, rolling and churning, and from time to time blew out gusts of strange icy yin wind, accompanied by piercing wails that made one's hair stand on end.

The three men's expressions were extremely exhausted; their breaths were even weaker than before by several degrees, and the three giant worms beneath them had already vanished, yet as they gazed at the mist sea, their eyes all flickered with excitement.

This was naturally because before the mist sea stood a towering blood-red archway.

This archway is over a hundred zhang tall, inscribed with countless blood-red runes, but at its very top are two large silver ancient characters, clearly writing the words "Blood Prison."

"This is the Blood Prison, somewhat different from what I imagined." The old man with the surname Yu stared at the mist sea for a while, then murmured.

"It must be an illusion-dispelling technique. Let me try to dispel it!" The old man beside him with the surname Yu flashed his eyes and replied.

Then he shook his sleeve, and from it flew a green wooden tablet inlaid with black ghost heads; he pinched a seal with one hand, and a finger pointed into the void.

With a "pfft" sound!

The green wooden tablet swelled in the wind, instantly expanding to the size of a door; its surface instantly flashed with five-colored green runes, and simultaneously the ghost heads on it opened their eyes and slowly opened their mouths.

With a booming roar!

From the ghost's mouth spewed a column of green light, which then spun around and instantly transformed into an enormous green wind column, flashing into the nearby mist sea.

The next moment, thunderous rumbles erupted from the black mist sea; amidst the raging green wind, nearby mist was swept away, forming an exceptionally clear passage.

The Wu Ling Three Saints immediately stared intently into the passage, and everyone's faces changed.

In the passage within sight, there was indeed a vast lake of thick blood water, its surface crawling with countless thumb-sized white maggot-like worms, making one's body turn cold just to look.

"This is the true face of the Blood Prison—could it also be an illusion?" The old man with the surname Yu stared blankly, unconsciously uttering a sentence.

"Hmph, under my Qinggang Wind, what illusion could remain unchanged?" The old man with the surname Wu snorted, suddenly opened his mouth, and spat out several clusters of jing qi that sank into the green wooden tablet.

Immediately, the gentle wind from the ghost's mouth became over ten times stronger than before, and a continuous stream of rolling wind poured forth.

After the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, the vast mist sea was entirely swept away by the raging wind, revealing most of the blood lake's condition.

The three old men looked again, and their faces all turned joyful.

On the blood lake, besides the dense swarms of maggot worms, there suddenly appeared over a dozen black iron cages of various sizes.

These iron cages are small at just over a zhang tall, large up to over a thousand zhang tall; not only are their surfaces covered with unknown pale gold runes, but the inner bars are also covered with countless blood-red sharp spikes, looking extraordinarily ferocious.

Most of these iron cages have their doors wide open; only a few are seamlessly integrated as one piece, but inside each lies a corpse bone in a different posture.

Although these bones have likely existed for countless years and their skeletal structures vary greatly, the lingering traces of aura on them still caused the Wu Ling Three Saints to feel a surge of alarm upon sensing them.

"These people are the great enemies suppressed by the Xu Tian Ding True Person back then—indeed, they are all extraordinary. But which one is the corpse of the Lord Tian Wu? This requires careful identification."

The last old man stared at these bones, eyes gleaming, and said.

"This is easy to say—since Lord Tian Wu cultivated the Dao-comprehension method, even if he fell, his bones must differ from others'. As long as we get closer, we can naturally identify them easily." The old man with the surname Wu chuckled and said.

"The other corpses are also of notable figures, surely possessing great treasures on them; we cannot let them go." The old man with the surname Yu also revealed a hint of greedy urgency.

"That is natural. But our main purpose in coming here is for Lord Tian Wu's relics; to be safe, we should first obtain his robe and bowl." The old man with the surname Wu finally made his decision and said.

The other two agreed it made sense, immediately ceased arguing, each raised their hands to release several treasures to protect their bodies, then fled together as escape light straight toward the nearest black iron cage.

This blood lake is so strange that the three naturally dared not be careless in the slightest.

But to the Wu Ling Three Saints' great surprise, even after flying to the front of the iron cage, the blood sea remained eerily calm, with no change at all.

The three were greatly astonished, and naturally overjoyed.

However, after they each carefully used their divine sense to identify the aura of the clearly smaller-than-normal skeletal remains inside the cage, they all exchanged glances and shook their heads, then immediately flew toward another cage containing bones.

After distinguishing two cages in succession and finding neither a match, the three unknowingly flew to the very center of the blood lake.

There, they indeed saw a fourth iron cage containing bones.

But unlike the previous three, this iron cage is almost the largest on the blood lake, standing over five or six hundred zhang tall; besides the dense inward-facing spikes, the bones also bear an unknown length of blood-red chain, wrapped around them in countless loops.

The chain itself appears quite aged—not only is its surface covered in rust spots, but in some places, clear cracks can be seen, as if the bones had desperately struggled in life.

The bones inside the giant iron cage are half-human, half-horse; every bone is crystalline and emerald green, and within them, faint traces of golden light can be seen flowing intermittently.

Although the upper half of the bones is enormously large, the rest is no different from an ordinary human's—except the lower half, which is nearly a hundred zhang long, with four remaining giant hooves that are the only parts of the entire skeleton retaining some patches of dry, pale silver fur.

"No mistake—this must be the true body of the Tian Wu senior inside." The old man with the surname Yu merely sensed the terrifying aura emanating from within and exclaimed in delight.

"Indeed, it is the aura of the Wu Dao; after such a long time, it still retains such strength—no wonder it is Lord Tian Wu himself!" The last old man closed his eyes, sensed it again, and exclaimed with excitement.

"But where are Lord Tian Wu's robe and bowl?" The old man with the surname Wu looked for a while, then frowned and said.

This remark instantly woke the other two elders, who then realized that aside from this huge skeleton, there seemed to be nothing else suspicious inside the entire iron cage.

"What is that?" After the three of them examined it for a moment, the elder surnamed Yu's eyes brightened, and he suddenly pointed at a certain spot on the huge skeleton.

The other two quickly focused their gaze in that direction, and only then did they notice that within a rib as large as a crossbeam, there was a faint black shadow embedded in it; upon closer inspection, it appeared to be a jade tablet, or perhaps a bamboo slip-like object.

"Good, since this is undoubtedly the place where the Celestial Wu my lord fell, let's get to work—quickly open this cage." The elder surnamed Yu said hurriedly without further hesitation.

The other two naturally had no objections.

Immediately, the three elders' bodies were wrapped in rosy light, and several protective treasures instantly transformed into rolling waves that surged fiercely toward a certain point of the iron cage.

With a loud "Boom," a flash of Jin Guang appeared at a certain point of the black iron cage, erupting in blinding explosive light; the entire cage shuddered a few times before the light faded and it returned to calm.

After staring intently, the elder surnamed Wu's expression immediately turned somewhat grim.

Not a single trace remained on the surface of the entire iron cage.

"I'll try again!" The elder surnamed Yu's eyes flashed with a fierce light as he spoke, then he made a grasping motion in the void with one hand, and instantly a blood-red short sword appeared in his palm, its surface inscribed with countless strange spirit-worm patterns, while the hilt was inlaid with a thumb-sized crystal as white as jade.

The elder gripped the sword with one hand; a flash of blood light appeared, and he actually severed several fingers of his other hand, then, while muttering incantations, he pointed at the void.

Instantly, the severed fingers hissed as they turned into several streams of blood mist that drilled into the short sword.