Chapter 504: Nether Mark

Hearing Hua Changxi's provocative words, Lady White Bone paused briefly, then burst into a string of bell-like laughter as if she had heard the greatest joke in the world.

"Quite a bold tone."

She leaned lazily inside the palanquin, casually sweeping her gaze over the mindless ghost tribes surrounding them: "Since you do not wish to act, I shall collect these scattered 'leftovers' covering the ground on your behalf."

Before her voice faded, Lady White Bone slowly extended a hand from the palanquin, pale as jade.

The hand was exquisitely beautiful yet utterly bloodless, its nails displaying an eerie, semi-transparent bone color; her fingertip lightly tapped the void.

"Whoosh~"

An immensely terrifying suction force suddenly erupted, centered on the white palanquin!

The ghost tribes lying limp on the ground, stripped of their senses, found their bodies rising uncontrollably.

Like withered leaves swept up by a gale, they flew helplessly toward the white palanquin.

"No~"

Several ghost tribe leaders who still retained their senses filled their eyes with terror, desperately trying to grab onto the rocky ground; their nails scraped sparks across the hard black rock, yet they still could not resist that domineering pulling force.

Hua Changxi stood motionless, watching the scene with an expressionless face while secretly staying on guard; the ghost fire within her White Bone Lantern flickered unpredictably, as if it too sensed the terror of that power.

Those ghost tribes flying through the air began to rapidly shrivel the moment they came within three feet of the white palanquin.

Their soul power, spiritual essences, and even their ghost bodies were forcibly stripped away at a speed visible to the naked eye, transforming into streams of black light that flowed continuously into the palm of the woman in white, carried by that invisible suction.

In merely a few breaths, the dense crowd of ghosts before Zhongyuankou vanished without a trace, as if they had never existed.

This battlefield, originally filled with slaughter and plunder, instantly became deathly silent, clean to an excessive degree.

Lady White Bone lazily withdrew her hand, as if she had merely performed a trivial task: "The taste is mediocre; too many impurities."

She frowned in disgust, her gaze returning to Hua Changxi, her previously lazy eyes now turning playful: "You little ghost are quite interesting."

Though your aura is weak, you can manipulate ghost fire and even wield a soul weapon forged from the throat bone of a great demon ghost carriage.

As her words fell, the air around them seemed to solidify, an invisible pressure enveloping Hua Changxi.

Hua Changxi's expression remained unchanged as she silently met Lady White Bone's gaze, though the ghost fire within the White Bone Lantern in her hand flared up slightly stronger.

Lady White Bone stared at her, lightly tapping the edge of the palanquin with her fingertips, producing a crisp clicking sound, as if deliberating.

This female ghost's soul before her was too fragrant; devouring it would surely strengthen her own soul body.

But...

Lady White Bone glanced at the male ghost leading the way before the palanquin and the four ghosts carrying it, sighed helplessly, and softly exclaimed: "Forget it; today I shall not bother arguing with you."

She leaned lazily back into the palanquin: "Let us go."

As her voice fell, the white palanquin soared into the air once more.

The pathfinder and the palanquin bearers moved in perfect unison, carrying that grim white palanquin toward Zhongyuankou; without the slightest hesitation, they leaped down, vanishing like specters into the churning black sea of clouds.

After a disorienting fall, once their feet touched solid ground, Chu Junyi and his four companions, along with the white palanquin, had safely landed in an even darker territory.

Lady White Bone's lazy voice drifted out from within the palanquin: "Do not rush to leave just yet."

Hearing this, Chu Junyi turned to face the white palanquin: "Do you intend to ambush that female ghost in black from earlier?"

The curtain did not move; only a faint chuckle responded, serving as tacit acknowledgment.

Ye Jingzhou, who had been silently carrying the palanquin, spoke at this moment, his voice steady: "I advise you to think twice; I secretly cast a divination just now, and the hexagram indicates that if we confront that female ghost, we are likely to suffer a major setback."

At these words, the lazy smile on Lady White Bone's face instantly vanished, her posture straightening considerably, her tone carrying a hint of shock and doubt: "Is that so?"

She had always trusted the abilities of Chu Junyi and his four companions.

Were it not for this, she would never have willingly allowed herself to be coerced by them, nor would she have carried them wandering throughout the Nine Netherworlds.

Ye Jingzhou spoke with certainty: "Although I am not proficient in the art of divination, I can still discern basic fortunes and misfortunes."

Hearing this, Lady White Bone frowned tightly, a trace of reluctance flashing in her eyes: "What a pity..." Such a pure and fragrant soul was rare in the Nine Netherworlds!

Seeing this, Chu Junyi advised in a low voice from the side: "The Nine Netherworlds have been unsettled lately; it is best to avoid provoking powerful beings whose backgrounds are unclear. Do not forget that the clone of Lady Spider Lily was slain by an obscure little ghost."

These words acted like a basin of cold water, completely extinguishing the flicker of agitation in Lady White Bone's heart.

She sighed deeply, her tone gaining a measure of gravity: "Once the news that the Nine Netherworld Soul Realm is about to appear spread, it drew out all sorts of demons and monsters."

A moment later, she leaned back into the palanquin once more, returning to her previous laziness: "Forget it; let us continue our journey. The entrance from the third to the fourth layer of the Nine Netherworlds, Zhongyuankou, is not easy to find."

"You all must be careful; those capable of setting foot in the third layer of the Nine Netherworlds are no ordinary beings; do not let anyone discover your identities."

Only after the white palanquin had departed for a quarter of an hour did Hua Changxi's figure descend from Zhongyuankou.

The moment she landed, she extended her divine consciousness outward; finding no ambush, she lifted the White Bone Lantern again and quickly moved away from Zhongyuankou.

The third layer of the Nine Netherworlds felt even more suffocating.

If the first layer was a hazy grayness where one could still distinguish the path ahead, and the second layer was an oppressive darkness where one could rely on ghost fire for illumination, then this third layer was a deathly silence and grimness—even the darkness seemed to possess weight, heavily wrapping around every inch of perception.

There was no wind, yet a bone-piercing chill spread from all directions, like countless icy needles drilling through the pores into the flesh, stabbing straight into the marrow.

The eerie fire of the White Bone Lantern was suppressed here until it was only the size of a thumb, its halo shrinking to her feet, barely illuminating an area of several zhang.

Beyond the circle of light lay not pure darkness, but countless huge shadows standing indistinctly; some resembled beast bones magnified a hundred times, jagged and abrupt, while others looked like severed limbs left behind by ancient deities, twisted and bizarre.

Most terrifying of all was this dead silence.

There were no ghostly wails, no wolf howls, no roars of battle, and not even the chirping of insects could be heard.

This silence was like an invisible net, wrapping people within it, making even the sound of one's heartbeat unusually clear; each beat struck against taut nerves, causing inexplicable panic.

A stinging pain came from the back of her right hand; Hua Changxi lowered her head to look and saw a black fish pattern emerging on her hand, immediately realizing that the black flame on her Nascent Soul was flickering due to the environmental influence.

The flickering of the black flame meant that her state of mind had fluctuated, and moreover, it was a negative fluctuation.

Silently reciting the Clear Heart Mantra, Hua Changxi relied on the vibration amplitude of her broken blade to carefully hasten through the darkness.

She had not walked far when movement appeared in the mist ahead.

Hua Changxi stopped, held her breath, and pierced her gaze through the thin layer of ghost fire, staring fixedly ahead.

Soon, the mist slowly parted, and more than ten black figures emerged from the shadows.

They possessed burly builds with knotted muscles, exuding a ferocity and sharpness entirely different from that of the ghost tribes.

There was not a trace of the ghost race's gloominess in their eyes; instead, they burned with naked ferocity and violence, as if ready to tear apart everything before them at any moment.

The most striking feature was the black patterns carved between their eyebrows.

These were no ordinary totems, but rather jagged, ferocious cracks, like the marks left on a perfect piece of porcelain after being struck hard by a heavy hammer, frozen in a state just short of shattering.

The cracks erupted wildly from the center of their foreheads toward their hairlines, emitting an extremely unstable and violent aura; merely gazing at them caused a palpable throb in the heart.

Seeing the patterns on the newcomers' foreheads, Hua Changxi's gaze sharpened slightly as memories left by Lady Chi Yan swiftly surfaced in her mind.

Those patterns were called Nether Markings.

In the Nine Netherworlds, one could precisely identify a visitor's race and cultivation level by the shape, color, and number of their Nether Markings.

At this moment, the race Hua Changxi faced was the one in the Nine Netherworlds that loved battle most—the Demon Race!

The Nether Markings on the foreheads of these demons were all clearly visible, numbering neither more nor less than exactly four lines.

Four Nether Markings signified the Demon General realm.

In other words, each of these dozen-plus figures was a Demon General!