Chapter 531: line with translation of chapter title

At this moment, Yan Buji happened to fly to the gap of the broken sword, seeing dangerous red light flickering at the broken gap above, he frowned:

This is.... the demon race's arcane demon bone red light? That means the gap here is entirely made of arcane demon bone; even broken, does it still retain part of its power?

Yan Buji felt a headache; this arcane demon bone is inherently a very special demonic spiritual material, possessing an ability to destroy magical power, and the more there is, the effect increases exponentially!

Moreover, the gap of this fortress seemed to have previously used this property of arcane demon bone, arousing its red light to maximize the ability to weaken enemies!

"Even broken, it can still guarantee its power hasn't diminished much; could this fortress be a nine-turn fortress?" Yan Buji looked strange.

After all, the fortress is a super-large Accumulation Device, a massive armament; thus, even if the material selection isn't entirely Celestial Material, the higher the refinement turns, the more terrifying it becomes.

Yan Buji didn't know the fortress's origin, but he could sense it had existed here for at least tens of thousands of years, even hundreds of thousands; thus it's not hard to imagine how terrifying it was when completed.

"We still need to go in and see; after all, the best treasures might be hidden inside!" Yan Buji narrowed his eyes; passing through the arcane demon bone red light would likely seal his magical power, and though he might not be able to use the Heaven Gate Five Elements Law inside, fortunately his Immortal Essence should remain unaffected.

Yan Buji rushed in; the arcane demon bone red light gradually sealed his internal magical power, after a wave of weakness he immediately mobilized his Immortal Essence to continue charging!

Boom—

As he fell to the ground, Yan Buji frowned: "How is even my Immortal Essence affected? It seems the arcane demon bone red light has been mixed with something else."

At this moment, Yan Buji's Immortal Essence had been weakened by almost one-tenth; though the impact isn't great, a retreat in strength still poses considerable risk.

Fortunately, he entered safely; looking around, he found nothing but an empty open platform, with many doorways and passages around.

"If this place is merely an internal transfer station for personnel and resources, then these passages should lead to resource points."

Yan Buji couldn't guarantee either, for who knows if others have been here before? Or perhaps when the fortress was destroyed long ago, it had already been emptied.

But thinking of Yu Fei and Gu Yue, Yan Buji suspected there must be great treasures inside, and the thought made him itch to search.

After casually approaching a passage, Yan Buji touched the wall and carefully sensed it.

"Not sequium alloy....."

Yan Buji saw a piece of wall debris, picked it up and refined it.

"Should be.... dragon true copper? What a grand hand, using seven-transformation Celestial Material as the main framework?" Yan Buji looked envious; unfortunately, these dragon true coppers, after being refined by the demon race's secret method, even if they retain some properties, are hard to utilize.

He tossed the debris aside, Yan Buji followed the passage to a doorway, violently broke it open and peered inside.

Scattered ashes and debris on the ground made Yan Buji shake his head; after scanning with his divine sense several times, he found nothing useful.

Next, Yan Buji followed the passage for a long time, encountering many mechanisms; fortunately, most of the fortress's functions had failed, so he passed through safely.

"Speaking of which, what's the purpose of installing so many mechanisms inside one's own fortress?" Yan Buji looked strange.

"This isn't for building one's own tomb; who are all these mechanisms designed against?"

Moreover, such a huge war fortress must be heavily guarded; setting up so many mechanisms seems like "there's no silver here but three hundred taels," as if fearing others would come in to steal your things.

"How strange....." Yan Buji gradually disassembled a trap he had touched, looking inside along its interior.

"These trap mechanisms are hidden very secretly, and most of them connect to the passage entrance or the gate's opening point; also this device....."

Yan Buji reached out and pulled a square box from the trap, examining it carefully.

"As expected!"

After taking the box apart and then further disassembling it, he discovered there was a middle-grade Spiritual Stone inside; together with the box's components, Yan Buji realized this mechanism is actually an Accumulation Device that automatically activates when the fortress's main power supply is severed.

"So many of these mechanisms should have such a box as a backup activation device, equipped with a Spiritual Stone, fracture-response parts, trap-linkage parts, touch-triggered alarm, and this outer layer of concealed paint." Yan Buji's eyes lit up.

Although I still don't understand what the person who refined this fortress was thinking, laying so many traps inside a fortress—who were they guarding against? —but it is indeed sufficient for surprise.

Moreover, this person is creative; although I don't fully understand these things, if used for tomb-building, they'd probably be a nightmare for grave robbers.

Speaking of which, coming here myself is pretty much like grave robbing.

Or perhaps that person had long anticipated the day this fortress would be destroyed, and to prevent its treasures from being taken by petty villains, they designed so many mechanisms?

"Is that necessary? Unless it's treasure that can't be taken away; but if they anticipated the fortress would be destroyed, why not destroy the immovable things together?"

Thus Yan Buji doesn't understand what the fortress's designer was thinking; in his view, even if there are things that can't be taken from the fortress, it wouldn't be worth spending such huge effort upfront on useless work.

Except.....

Yan Buji suddenly thought of something, his face drastically changing: "Unless these are all blinders! This fortress.... perhaps it was intentionally designed as a tomb from the outset, knowing death was certain, he thought to use the mechanisms to gain a resting place after defeat in the great war, awaiting future rebirth?!"

If that's the case, then the fortress's owner is probably not the designer.

Because since the fortress was activated, and now it has become this wretched state, it must be that the owner died in battle; his enemies would surely not let him go, they would surely crush his bones and scatter his ashes! And the designer perhaps also acted according to the fortress owner's will, deliberately making the fortress resemble a tomb.

Even if the fortress's owner perished and vanished, some things could still be hidden. Perhaps those things couldn't be found back then; the victors, seeing the fortress, couldn't make use of it as waste and discarded it, waiting for those years to pass.....

"What exactly did the fortress's owner hide? Is it his own descendants, or does this designer truly have the ability to deceive heaven and cross the sea, feigning death to escape?"

Yan Buji proposed some guesses based on the excess traps in the fortress; as to whether they are true, he also has a method to verify them!