Chapter 279: The Strange Mingtu, the Mysterious Summons

As he thought this, a rare flicker of anger rose in Baichuan's heart, and the phantom in the sky shifted once more. A terrifying, oppressive aura silently spread out, and under its influence, the great serpent's phantom began to slowly transform.

First, the beautiful coral-like great horns representing a dragon slowly emerged, then one dragon claw after another rose from beneath the phantom, before bursting forth entirely.

In an instant, the great serpent's phantom had clearly become a mysterious creature bearing both dragon and serpent traits.

At the same time, an aura even more terrifying than the pressure of that mysterious human figure spread out.

A vast, imposing presence, deep as an abyss and grim as a prison, pounded against this place like ocean waves, each crest higher than the last.

The earth began to crack, countless living creatures trembled, and some of the slightly weaker ones were already bleeding from all seven orifices.

At the same time, inside Yinbao Building.

"You mean to stop me?"

The moment those words came from the mysterious great serpent, the true overseer of this branch faction—the building master, who was wielding a projection clone bestowed by Yin Bao Tian Zun—felt his heart lurch violently, and an ominous premonition arose within him.

His intuition told him that once he responded, the one to die in the end would surely be him!

This—how could this possibly be?!

After reaching this conclusion, his first feeling was disbelief. One had to know that the figure outside was the true master behind their Yinbao Building—a projection clone of Yin Bao Tian Zun.

Even though the projection clone possessed only the strength of a True Monarch, who beneath the heavens could stand against one?

But the premonition in his heart at this moment could not be false—it was a mystical ability granted by the art he cultivated, and it could not be false.

At the same time, the aura outside, even more powerful than the projection clone he controlled, could not be false either.

The fact that he had lived so long and reached this point was in no small part thanks to this ability.

In an instant, faced with the choice between his life and upholding Yinbao Building's rules, his heart wavered.

What came with it was that the mysterious, majestic figure in the sky outside ceased all movement, standing silently in midair as if pondering something.

Seeing this, Baichuan gave a light snort and directed his phantom to attack.

The phantom, now transformed into a half-dragon, half-serpent, responded to his will, opened its massive dragon maw, and fiercely spewed forth a scorching Dragon Breath of black-purple mingled with gold.

This was the fusion of two kinds of flame power—Golden Flame and Dragon Breath.

"No! No! Spare, spare me…"

"I hate it! I hate this!!!"

"I curse you…"

The terrifying flames fell toward the ground like heavenly fire. In the eyes of the old wolf and the centipede, however, it was a calamity of the utmost kind. Faced with mortal peril, the former continued to beg for mercy, while the latter, filled with resentment and unwillingness, tried to curse its foe.

But before a force as calamitous as a natural disaster, no resistance availed in the slightest.

The earth suddenly sank, and a massive Luli Shenkeng appeared, after which wisps of grey smoke rose in curling columns—those were curses burned clean by flames that were utterly yang and could also assail the soul and consciousness.

In an instant, the wolf and the centipede were slain clean by Baichuan before the projection clone controlled by the building master, leaving only the building master with a face dark as iron.

He had been slapped in the face publicly before every living creature in all of Yinling Town by a mysterious great serpent, and yet he dared not make a single move.

"Where is the entrance to Mingtu?"

However, his daring not to move did not mean Baichuan would still show him face. With his anger now risen, Baichuan would not spare the other's dignity—his purpose was extremely clear, and he no longer wished to waste time.

To the building master, however, these words were a naked provocation, a humiliation.

Because a True Monarch-level expert had no need for Yinbao Building's entrance.

This was forcing him to humbly request that the other party leave!

His fist clenched several times, but in the end he loosened it again.

Because he feared death—otherwise, with his talent, he would never have fallen to being the building master of such a small place.

"This way."

With a silent sigh, the building master thought to himself: today truly was a disaster brought on by no fault of his own. If only he had pretended to see nothing at all—those two beasts had ruined him!

Complaints aside, he could only borrow the power of the projection clone and, with a casual flick, help the other party open the passage to Mingtu.

He did not dare let this mysterious expert step into Yinbao Building; at this moment, he only wanted the other party to leave quickly.

Under a peculiar force, a cave-mouth radiating a dark, ghostly yin energy appeared in the void. Through that deep opening, one could faintly see the dim, sunless land on the other side—a blackish-brown earth full of cracked, glowing-red fissures, with magma flowing within.

Seeing that his objective had finally been achieved, Baichuan no longer hesitated. He cast the other a meaningful glance, then stepped in on his own accord.

"What kind of divine being is this, after all? A serpent? Or a dragon?"

After watching the other enter, the building master—who had never shown his true face—dispelled the Tian Zun projection clone and sighed a remark.

Based on the methods the other had used, he could not find any True Monarch great power in his memory that matched.

Truly strange.

……

Whoosh—whoosh—

A bizarre purple storm swept past, carrying endless sand and dust.

"What a strange world."

This was already Baichuan's third day after entering Mingtu, and he still could not help but sigh in wonder at this bizarre, fantastical world.

He had thought that a world without a sun, filled with all manner of gods, ghosts, and demons, was strange enough—but compared to the world before his eyes, that mortal realm outside was actually rather normal.

A sky forever sallow, with no division between day and night; oppressive black clouds that occasionally flickered with red lightning; a grey-brown earth reeking of burning; fissures of flowing, glowing-red magma; collapsed structures of all manner of strange designs—among them, Baichuan always felt a faint, inexplicable sense of familiarity.

The bizarre purple storms that swept through from time to time, and the eerie sounds drifting faintly through the air like the wailing of ghosts—when one added to that the strange creatures that would suddenly struggle up from beneath the earth, among them corpse-ghosts Baichuan recognized, as well as other bizarre beings he had never seen—zombies, skeletons, humanoid figures with rotting flesh, shadow-like uncanny creatures, and translucent, half-solid ghost-shadows drifting about were everywhere to be seen.

This was a world that seemed like a wasteland after a catastrophe.

He also did not know how such a bizarre world had come to be.

After sighing a few times, a few doubts flashed through Baichuan's mind. Hadn't Jin Ming said that once he entered the depths of Mingtu, he would simply know on his own?

It had already been three days since he entered, yet still nothing was clear…

"Come… here…"

"Come… come over here…"

"Come... to me... I have... something for you..."

The instant Baichuan thought about where the depths of Mingtu were, a murmuring whisper from nowhere reached his ear, carrying a strange allure within it.

……

(End of chapter)