Chapter 121

Chapter 121: Juying Awakens

“Captain, you’re poisoned.” Xu Qing glanced at the captain.

“Poisoned? I’m not poisoned. I’m so powerful, so how could I be poisoned?” The captain raised his eyebrows and replied with a surprised tone.

“You are poisoned.”

Xu Qing looked at the captain’s greenish-black face, already as dark as the seawater, and spoke seriously.

The captain’s expression also turned serious.

“Vice captain Xu, you can’t just speak nonsense. Do you have any evidence for your words? All that happened was that I saw a sea fruit that looked very tasty, so I took a bite. Then, well, a little bit of wicked wind[1] entered my body. Ah, it seems you shouldn’t eat sea fruits indiscriminately.”

As the captain spoke he seemed to feel his face swell a little. He quickly took out some more detoxification pills and stuffed them into his mouth, quickly chewing and gulping them down.

In fact, the captain was feeling quite depressed at the moment. Although he entered the water first, he had hidden himself, intending for Xu Qing to explore the way first so he could follow behind.

He didn’t expect this kid to spread poison the entire way!

Seeing Xu Qing about to open his mouth again, the captain hurriedly looked around and pointed at Zhang San in the distance, who was pretending to be a corpse.

“Hey, look over there, isn’t that Zhang San?”

With those words, the captain quickly dodged past Xu Qing and ran over to Zhang San. When he arrived at the faux corpse, he sent out a kick, which Zhang San rolled to avoid. Lying on the ground, Zhang San lifted his head to see the captain, as well as Xu Qing walking over.

“Hey, captain, have you been poisoned?” Zhang San looked at the captain’s greenish-black face in surprise.

“Shut up.” The captain cleared his throat and quickly spoke.

“What are you doing? Do you think there’s anything good to be had pretending to be a corpse over here? Come on, follow me. I know where the real treasures are.” As he spoke, the captain scanned the surroundings and ran in a certain direction.

Zhang San immediately jumped up from the ground, greeting Xu Qing in passing as he rushed to follow the captain.

“Vice captain Xu, if you still want Foundation Establishment Pills, hurry up and follow me.” In the distance, the captain waved to Xu Qing as he moved.

Xu Qing narrowed his eyes. He first scanned the chaotic battlefield all around him, then looked in the direction where the captain was running. That direction… was also where the Spiritual Breath Lamp’s resonance pointed. He didn’t hesitate any further and quickly ran to follow the captain and Zhang San.

Just like that, the trio quickly left the battlefield of this underwater world. None of the three were weak, so they were able to smoothly overcome whatever obstacles got in their way as they were leaving.

The captain was clearly in a hurry. With each of his attacks, a powerful cold energy would appear, and all the merfolk cultivators who touched it would instantly turn into ice sculptures.

Zhang San’s style was different from the captain’s. He pulled out all kinds of gadgets and threw them out. Apparently, they were all bombs, and they exploded at the slightest touch, easily killing the merfolk cultivators.

As they moved forward, Zhang San tossed these little bombs in all directions, preventing the merfolk from successfully encircling them.

But what he used most was a silk thread that was so thin that it was almost invisible to the naked eye. As he moved forward, the incomparably sharp silk thread sliced open the merfolk who had been frozen into ice sculptures by the captain’s attacks.

It was obvious that Zhang San and the captain had cooperated before. They couldn’t be more familiar with each other, making the speed of their advance faster and faster.

Xu Qing even saw that Zhang San was holding a silk thread that was attached to the captain, allowing him to follow along even more swiftly.

Xu Qing’s own attacks were different from the captain’s and Zhang San’s. To be precise, he didn’t “attack” at all, but released a poison powder that specifically targeted merfolk into the water.

As he moved forward, all the merfolk who approached him corroded away into nothing one after another. Even if they instantly retreated, they couldn’t escape the fate of death.

Zhang San’s expression changed drastically when he saw this. He quickly took out some detoxification pills and gulped them down, even speeding up to try and distance himself from Xu Qing.

As for the captain, he had already been swallowing detoxification pills since earlier.

Just like that, the three of them soon left the battlefield. Xu Qing saw that the captain was heading in the same direction where the divine priests had come from earlier and instantly fell into thought.

An hour later, the sounds of battle behind them had mostly faded, and a group of bizarre buildings appeared in front of the trio.

Although the buildings over here were also made of coral, their color was astonishingly black, twisting into towering dome-like halls. Stylistically speaking, they were somewhat similar to the temple complex in the jungle forbidden area.

“Temples?” Xu Qing’s eyes narrowed. The resonance he felt from the Spiritual Breath Lamp seemed to be around here. However, the time wasn’t right for him to take it out and check.

“It’s here!” The captain sounded excited. His speed suddenly increased, running straight toward the temple complex.

Their arrival immediately caused the merfolk guards inside the temple complex to rush out. However, there weren’t many guards remaining.

At any other time, this place would be heavily guarded. But now that the merfolk race was suffering a catastrophe, most of the divine priests and guards had left to fight in various places in the underwater world.

Thanks to the captain’s strength, Zhang San’s bombs, and Xu Qing’s poison, the trio quickly entered deep into the temple complex.

During this period of time, they had encountered several Foundation Establishment cultivators who had been suppressed down to the peak of Qi Condensation, but the captain seemed to grow stronger and stronger. Wherever he passed, only frozen ice sculptures were left in his wake.

Xu Qing was shocked and became even more wary of the captain’s strength. At the same time, he became certain that the captain had a clear goal in coming here.

From the very beginning, the captain hadn’t strayed at all and charged forward in a straight line.

“Could it be that the captain’s goal is the same as mine?” Xu Qing’s vigilance rose, and he followed in silence.

After a while, the trio finally reached the very heart of the temple complex. Standing in front of an azure temple, the captain opened his mouth to speak.

“Zhang San, set up traps around here. Take out all those things you’ve been hiding away. Don’t worry, I’ll reimburse you when we get back.”

“Xu Qing, scatter some more poison. Don’t hold back, I’ll reimburse you!”

Zhang San immediately took action upon hearing these words, quickly arranging some mechanisms that would explode at the slightest touch. Each of them was also disguised and cleverly placed so that it was extremely difficult to see them at first glance.

For example, he dug a pit and buried a bomb inside. The pit was only slightly deeper than other places, and it seemed like even stepping on it might not trigger the trap.

“The first one to pass will be fine, but if a second one tries – boom.” Zhang San smiled foolishly when he noticed Xu Qing looking at him.

Xu Qing fell silent and recalled the direction of the Spiritual Breath Lamp’s resonance. Although it had pointed in this direction, it didn’t seem to lead to this temple; instead, it was deeper in the temple complex.

This discovery made him heave a sigh of relief. After Zhang San finished setting up the traps, Xu Qing took out poison powder and scattered it all around. Anyone approaching the temple would have a slim chance of survival.

Then he looked at the captain.

The captain seemed to be in a joyful mood. He opened the gates of the temple and beckoned Xu Qing and Zhang San to enter.

The temple was basically totally empty. There were no treasures, only a statue of Juying erected in the middle of the hall.

“Captain, what are you planning? There’s nothing here. Where’s the treasure I was promised?!” Seeing the empty surroundings, Zhang San instantly grew anxious.

Xu Qing didn’t speak, only staring deadpan at the captain.

“Hehe, both of you, there’s no need to worry.” The captain squatted down and smiled.

“Just wait for a bit. I promise you’ll get what you want.” After saying that, the captain took out a closed, withered eye, one that didn’t seem to belong to a human. After putting the eye aside, the captain formed a hand seal.

All of a sudden, the withered eye flew open. Reflected in its iris was what seemed to be the world outside the islands.

“Come on, let’s watch the show first.” The captain looked excited.

"Mind-Connecting Eye? That’s so expensive, how did you end up with one?!” Zhang San inhaled sharply and quickly crowded over.

Xu Qing looked at the strange eye warily, then glanced at the captain. Then he stepped back from the other two and began looking around.

Indeed, aside from the statue, there really wasn’t anything else here.

And the statue itself seemed to be made of normal coral, without any fluctuations of divinity. However, this wasn’t enough for Xu Qing to relax. He clearly remembered that in the temple in the jungle forbidden area, the blade-wielding stone statue also hadn’t seemed the slightest bit unusual.

In any case, he had no intentions of staying here for an extended period of time. He looked around again, waiting for an opportunity to leave.

But at that moment, the earth suddenly trembled violently, and a loud rumble rolled over from the distance. It was like a massive storm sweeping in all directions.

Moreover, sharp howls off in the distance cut through the rumbles, as if piercing through all obstacles to echo throughout the entire underwater world.

The rumbling and sharp howls came from the battlefield Xu Qing had been in earlier. By now, there were corpses strewn all over the place. Countless deaths had occurred, and the dozen over divine priests were in a sorry state.

Most of the strange beasts created with their divine arts had already died, so the priests uttered sharp howls as their eyes filled with madness. Their bodies began to burn away rapidly.

It seemed that they were using the burning of their life force to perform some terrifying spell.

All around the underwater world, divine priests howled and burned themselves up one after another. Their howls merged together, growing stronger and stronger and becoming more and more piercing.

With hundreds of divine priests sacrificing themselves all over Juying Island’s underwater, a sharp howl seemed to echo from Juying Island itself, piercing through the sky-sealing array outside and echoing into the depths of the sea.

As if it was… calling someone!

Soon, a deep roar answered from the bottom of the sea.

This roar was like the echo of heaven and earth, carrying an indescribably terrifying aura.

As soon as it rang out, enormous waves instantly churned in the sea region thousands of kilometers all around. The sky darkened, and wind and clouds rolled in.

Deep at the bottom of the sea… an enormous figure appeared!

This figure seemed tens of thousands of meters tall, with an imposing aura just like that of a god.

It seemed that every movement was strenuous for it, but whenever it moved, the bottom of the sea quaked and huge waves rose up.

And then came the terrifying pressure.

The countless sea beasts nearby all trembled, regardless of how strong their cultivation bases were. The immense pressure rolling off the god-like figure at the bottom of the sea made the souls of all the Seven Blood Pupils cultivators tremble.

Rumbling sounds echoed out constantly. If someone was looking at it from high in the sky, if that person had a pair of eyes that could penetrate the dark sea, then they would see that down at the bottom of the sea, there was a person wearing a robe made of countless fish bones. It was an old woman, covered by tentacles, walking toward the merfolk race’s islands step by step.

Her face was wrinkled, and more than half of it was covered with rotting flesh. However, her golden eyes carried a profound gaze that lacked the slightest emotion, and her aura was filled with heterogeneity, as well as a powerful divinity.

Each of the tentacles on her body was covered with similarly golden eyes. More than half of them were open, and they were all looking at the islands in the distance.

Behind the old woman, as the fish bone robe fluttered, a huge scarlet tongue could be seen. The tongue was covered with countless dead souls.

Looking carefully, it could be seen that these dead souls were all divine priests of the merfolk race. They were all letting out sharp howls, as if responding to the sounds from Juying Island.

The sky-sealing array covering Juying Island seemed to have been struck and became transparent, allowing the cultivators on the island to finally see the outside world clearly, as well as the giant figure that was approaching.

This figure was none other than the god worshiped by the merfolk race… Juying!

[1] “Wicked wind” (literally wind evil) seems to be some sort of TCM concept, causing things like the common cold. When I was a kid my mom (Thai, but sort of Chinese-influenced) always told me if I slept with my belly exposed then “wind” would come into my body and make me sick.

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