Chapter 69: Cave

Ji You had no idea his reputation outside had been utterly ruined.

Something about one fiancée, two fiancées, everywhere there were fiancées.

He didn’t know someone was waiting for him right now, eager to see what his nonexistent fiancée looked like…

At this moment, he was crouching low, following Yuanchen through a narrow, dark cave, his chest tightening from bending too long.

This jade tablet... is it a Gao De plaque?

In the darkness, Ji You groped forward, sensing the surrounding energy had become wildly agitated, like the calm before a storm.

At this moment, the cave echoed with continuous tearing sounds, accompanied by bursts of ecstatic cries.

Ji You didn’t know what the disciples of the immortal sects had seen on the mountain, but breakthrough energies kept surging upward, as if true immortal fortune truly lay here.

Yet enlightenment, as the term implies, hinges on the word “awaken.”

He believed there might be triggers to awaken enlightenment, but to claim something could bypass awakening entirely and grant enlightenment through external force was inherently illogical.

It’s like studying: you may take pills to enhance memory, but you still must see with your own eyes.

Unless there existed some incomprehensible force within the Qingyun Realm.

Just then, Yuanchen, who walked ahead, suddenly called out, “Brother-in-law.”

Ji You, using the glow of the jade disc, looked ahead and saw blood-red rock ahead—two distinct stone types formed a sharp boundary where they met, like oil separating from water.

“The rock outside the mountain is ordinary stone, but what’s wrapped inside… may not be anything ordinary.”

Ji You muttered to himself: “Hurry forward, get it done fast, then you pay and I retreat—money and goods settled.”

Yuanchen pouted: “Where’s my sister?”

“Don’t even think about using your sister to lure a brilliant genius like me back home.”

After hearing this, Yuanchen sulked behind him, and soon the two passed through the cave and entered a vast, silent stone cavern.

And what chilled them was that bones lay everywhere.

The good news was that more than half of these bones weren’t human—by shape alone, their differences were clear.

Especially one enormous bone, resembling a femur, thicker than Ji You’s entire body.

“Di people…” Yuanchen murmured.

“What?”

Yuanchen looked up at him: “Legend says there was a colossal race in ancient times, dwelling in the Ten Thousand Mountains beyond Jiuzhou, but they were eventually devoured by the descendants. Still, one tribe among the barbarians seems to retain a trace of this race’s bloodline—though they must enter a frenzy to awaken their giant form.”

“When the Northern Garrison Army seized the Northern Plains, they encountered such a barbarian unit, but their physiques were no longer as formidable as their ancestors’.”

Ji You frowned: “Barbarians aren’t a single race, but a general term?”

Yuanchen turned to look at him, and Ji You felt the condescension of a high schooler eyeing a middle schooler.

Ji You chuckled: “I’m from Fengzhou, Yuyang County—a place where you eat today’s meal and wonder about tomorrow’s. Only Master Chen’s house had a few tattered books, none even with illustrations. What do you expect me to know?”

Yuanchen blinked: “There are places that poor? No wonder Brother-in-law’s so obsessed with money.”

“Can’t help it. I’m terrified of being poor.”

Yuanchen turned back to the femur: “Actually, this isn’t a secret. The ancient war was so brutal that other tribes fled beyond the Northern Plains to the barbarian continent to escape it. So ‘barbarians’ aren’t just one race—they’re all non-human races.”

Ji You pondered: “Aren’t there also demon races?”

“Correct. But during that war, the demon races sided with humanity, so they’re not counted among the barbarians.”

As Ji You was thinking, he suddenly reached out and grabbed Yuanchen by the shoulder as he walked ahead.

The sudden loss of support made the tendons in his arm bulge, yet the explosive force he generated was just enough to halt Yuanchen’s full weight.

Yuanchen’s feet dangled in midair, sweat instantly beading on his forehead.

He hadn’t noticed ahead—there was no ground anymore. He was suspended over a deep pit below.

Had Ji You not grabbed him in time, he would’ve fallen straight in.

Then Yuanchen was pulled up, and with the jade disc’s light, he looked down.

The pit below was filled with corpses—tangled, layered, piled one atop another.

Unlike the ancient bones earlier, these were humans—or rather, cultivators.

All the corpses had their abdomens slit open, leaving a massive hollow at the center.

Before coming here, Ji You had been nothing but a naive college student, clueless about judging time of death.

Moreover, this ruin seemed to lack the natural process of “decay”—even the best detective would be useless here.

But from the dried bloodstains and the thick layer of dust covering the clothes, these corpses weren’t recent.

The good news: none of these people were alchemists.

Ji You crouched down, pointing at the hollows to Yuanchen: “What’s missing from this spot?”

“Spiritual core…”

“?”

Yuanchen swallowed hard, a chill running down his spine.

Alchemists are also physicians—they understand human anatomy well. After Qi Refining, cultivators generate a spiritual core, which resides here.

Yet even he had never seen a living spiritual core being surgically extracted.

How much pain must that cause…

Though Yuanchen didn’t cultivate the Dao and hadn’t formed a spiritual core, he still possessed an internal elixir. Just looking made him ache.

He turned to look at Ji You—and found the other’s expression unchanged, utterly unmoved.

Ji You, in turn, looked back at him, thinking: Why are you staring at me? I don’t have one of those either.

“What can you do with a spiritual core once removed?”

“Once removed from the body, it becomes a spirit pearl—probably nothing special. Or perhaps there’s something I don’t know.”

The Heavenly Book Academy once had disciples go missing; later, five corpses were found in a cave.

To avoid panic and prevent other immortal sects and noble families from developing ulterior motives, the governing office never disclosed details publicly.

Even so, Ji You could faintly recall those missing Heavenly Book Academy disciples.

“Keep moving. Find whoever’s here fast—can’t earn money if you’re dead.”

Ji You drew his longsword; spiritual energy drifted like smoke over the blade, casting a cold gleam through the night.

The lower three realms refine the body, following the path of spiritual energy tempering the flesh.

Only at the final stage—the Ascended Refinement realm—can one condense a spiritual core, completing the lower three realms.

That means those who died here were at least Ascended Refinement, possibly even fully perfected in the lower three realms—same as his own cultivation base.

These thousand taels of gold were earned with real difficulty.

As the two pressed forward, they saw countless iron cages lining the entire cavern, densely packed, the walls scarred with claw marks.

Besides the cages, there were also cushions, incense burners, and other items—by quantity, many people had been here.

But like the corpses in the pit, all the cushions and incense burners were coated in a fine layer of dust, undisturbed for at least half a month.

The ruin once called the “Unknown Place” had long been occupied, then plagued by evil, until immortal fortune emerged…

Then its inhabitants fled early, leaving behind only a vast conspiracy.

As Ji You pondered, Yuanchen’s jade disc suddenly flared with radiant light.

The spiritual energy’s resonance rapidly spun the disc, locking onto the southern wall of the cavern.

Yuanchen clutched the disc and sprinted forward.

At that moment, a thunderous boom echoed from the mountain peak—the surrounding peaks began to shake violently.

(End of Chapter)