The Forbidden Path to Immortality-Chapter 250

Yan Shuiyue snorted, then spread her hands, forming a few quick seals with her fingers. “I know you don’t believe me,” she said, “but I promised, so I’ll give you an answer… just give me a half of an hour.”

She shot Li Xun a sharp glare, then closed her eyes and slowly sat down, slipping into meditation.

Li Xun’s smile vanished at once.

They’d known each other for decades. Even if they didn’t meet often, he knew her well enough to understand one thing. When it came to matters of fate and destiny, Yan Shuiyue was serious. She might stay silent for years, but once she spoke, her words always carried weight.

In other words, the ‘Three-Kill Formation” formation... and the “Blood-Eyed Demon”… there was a very real chance it was already set in stone.

When death’s right there and unpredictable, how many people can actually stay calm?

At that moment, Li Xun’s thoughts went completely haywire. One second he was feeling the dark fire building up inside him, the next he saw the fiery dress of the Demon Phoenix. In a blink, it was Qing Yin’s cold, heartless face, her eyes so deep it felt like they could pull his soul in and tear it apart…

Li Xun broke out in a cold sweat and finally cleared his head. When he turned to look at Yan Shuiyue, he saw that her eyes were already open.

“So soon?” he muttered.

“You’ve been spacing out for a while.” Yan Shuiyue said matter-of-factly, shrugging her lips without saying much more. But the look on her face said more than words ever could. Clearly, Li Xun had just lost a bit of face in front of her.

Luckily, Li Xun had a thick enough skin to pretend nothing happened. He smiled. “So, did you figure it out?”

“No,” she answered flatly. Seeing the way Li Xun froze, she tilted her head helplessly. “Some variables just won’t add up… hmm. Are you sure that face you’re wearing right now is actually yours?”

Li Xun looked at her saying nothing.

But that silence said it all. Yan Shuiyue blinked, then sprang up with a yelp. She pointed at his face, jabbering for a good long while before realizing she’d overdone it. Sheepishly, she forced a smile and pressed her palms together in an apology.

“Happens all the time, really-I get it. Then everything makes sense. If you could just show me your real face… uh, I mean, only if you want to. If not, that’s fine too.”

“Then let’s leave it at that,” Li Xun said, smothering the flicker of killing intent that had just risen in his chest. He gave a small smile. “Some truths aren’t meant to be seen too clearly. Knowing too much can be dangerous.”

“Right, right,” Yan Shuiyue nodded hard in agreement.

With ther brains, she knew she’d just stumbled into a major taboo. The fact that he hadn’t killed her on the spot was already more mercy than she deserved. Now she could only nod her head like a chicken, trying her best to look obedient in every way.

“Honestly,” she said quickly, “even if I had figured it out, it might not be a good thing. You know that saying... knowing is easy, doing is hard? That’s what it means. Uh… if you’re not satisfied, you can always throw in another question or two later.”

Li Xun chuckled but finally shook his head. “Forget it. Let’s keep it at two. I haven’t even figured out what to ask yet.”

“No problem. Just ask me when you’ve made up your mind—”

She suddenly froze, realization hitting her like lightning. She jumped three feet high and shouted, “Haven’t made up my mind?! You’re playing me!”

“If that’s what you think, then sure,” Li Xun said lazily.

Li Xun reached out and gently patted Yan Shuiyue’s cheek. A habit he seemed to be getting fond of. “Come on. Before I get answers to those two questions, don’t get any funny ideas. Otherwise, the reputation of the Water Mirror Sect, built over tens of thousands of years,’ll be ruined by you, the treacherous little beauty.”

“Despicable! Shameless! Disgusting! Filthy! Vile! Scoundrel! Rogue!”

Yan Shuiyue was truly furious now. She lunged at Li Xun, teeth bared and claws out, ready to fight him to the death.

But the gap in their cultivation was far too great. Li Xun lifted a finger and tapped her lightly on the forehead. A soft gasp escaped her lips, her bright eyes dimmed, and her body went limp, falling straight into his arms.

As the feedback from Nether One flowed through his mind, Li Xun drew in a deep breath and gave a silent command. Nether One appeared soundlessly at his side.

He handed the unconscious girl over to him, then shot up into the sky.

He made no effort to hide his presence, and soon, many nearby cultivators took notice. But after a single glance, each one quietly backed off, faces tinged with unease. Arrogance had its limits. And this was someone no one wanted to provoke.

With a cold snort, Li Xun didn’t bother with them. Channeling his true breath, he streaked eastward like lightning. Wherever he passed, an invisible path of empty air opened around him. And far below, Nether One slipped silently through the shadows.

...

There was no doubt about it. After a while, the Shadow-Devouring Soul Sect’s territory turned into a pot of porridge violently boiling under the hands of a lousy cook. Everything inside crashed and slammed together, splattering everywhere, yet somehow never blending into anything with real flavor.

The locals tried to keep their heads down, while the uninvited guests swaggered around without a care. Both sides moved through the vast land, crossing paths now and then. Each collision left the sect members humiliated. Before long, disciples of the Shadow-Devouring Soul Sect stopped going out altogether, and even when they did, they only appeared in tightly packed groups.

In this tense atmosphere, a dozen different versions of the story began spreading in all directions, carried along by every channel imaginable.

In the southwest of the Tongxuan Realm, a quiet unrest began to stir.

Amid this growing tension, Li Xun slipped out of his “seclusion” and vanished into the wild mountains surrounding Tenghua Valley, putting some distance between himself and the chaos outside.

The moment the Underworld Flame Yama mentioned Tenghua Valley that day, Li Xun immediately thought of that hidden place he’d stumbled upon years ago by sheer luck. The cave where the Yin qi seemed to have been accumulating for hundreds of thousands of years.

That spot was only seven or eight li from Tenghua Valley, tucked deep within the mountains. It lay right at a murky intersection between the Tongxuan Realm and the human world, where energies tangled and the terrain shifted unpredictably. It was concealed so well that you’d never know it was there unless fate dragged you to it.

It was after stepping out of that very place and accidentally wandering into Tenghua Valley that Li Xun got tangled in all the trouble that followed.

Could things in this world really line up with such perfect coincidence?

Li Xun stayed cautious, simply recalling where the spot was and using that memory as the starting point for his search.

Luckily, his memory was exceptional. After slipping out of Tenghua Valley, it took him less than an hour to find the place again.

The mountainside cavity was still there. Sixty-some years hadn’t changed it at all. In the center, the honeycomb-like cluster of holes released blue smoke and thick mist, which swirled together above the openings like pale-blue flames, flickering on and off.

Li Xun didn’t rush to examine the vents where the energy was rising. Instead, with mixed emotions, he looked over the “masterpieces” he’d carved into the surrounding rock walls all those years ago.

Seeing the clumsy strokes of his younger self, he couldn’t help but let out a quiet, wry laugh.

What he had once considered brilliant now looked full of flaws to his more experienced eyes.

Yet the bold, freewheeling creativity he had in his youth was something Li Xun could no longer recreate, no matter how hard he tried.

He found his fingers brushing over the old carvings. He felt both the lingering traces of youthful naivety and the dense Yin qi that had built up over decades.

Stone dust trickled down with a soft rustle, and a few new side cuts branched out. The yin qi stored within the rock naturally followed these fresh lines, slipping into a new cycle.

The rock walls seemed to change before his eyes, their color gradually darkening. This was the sign of the stone merging with the Yin qi. From this point on, the walls of the cave could not only further resist the corrosive effects of the Yin qi, but also harness it, transforming into a whole new kind of material.

You could easily imagine that if this place continued to gather yin qi for ages, then millions of years from now, some wandering cultivator might stumble in and discover a type of ore that had never existed in this world before.

When everything was finally done, Li Xun crouched down and stared at the countless tiny holes in the ground. The pale-blue light reflected on his face, giving it a deep, jade-like glow, as if it had been carved from stone.

The yin qi underground was so dense it formed a massive field of interference. Any attempt to probe it with divine senses simply vanished without a trace. It felt like throwing a stone into the ocean

Li Xun tried using an earth-escape technique to probe the area. Just as he’d suspected years ago, this gathering point of yin qi had risen from deep underground during a shift in the earth’s crust and become sealed inside this mountain cavity. Its source lay far below, with the yin qi seeping upward through layers of rock and soil, venting through these openings.

Judging by the position… was the source really in the mortal realm?

The boundary between the Tongxuan Realm and the Mortal Realm wasn't usually so clear. But Li Xun had never seen anything like this. A channel of Yin qi connecting the two realms from top to bottom.

If this truly was a vein of Nine Netherworlds Domain, no wonder the sect had searched for centuries without finding it. Who would’ve imagined that such pure, precious yin qi had been flowing straight into the human world all along?

Li Xun slowly ran his hand over the yin fire, feeling the unique pulse of its qi. He made sure to remember every detail. Then, shrinking his body, he followed the yin qi veins and sank down into the ground.

It was a miserable journey.

While the Yin flames that appeared where Yin Qi gathered were spectacular, it’s really just the surface expression of the earth’s veins and spiritual energy at work. The true Nine Netherworld Earth Qi, on the other hand, was subtle and elusive. Like it’s there, yet not really. It’s tightly restrained, almost hidden. Finding its real source, especially with several Yin veins interfering nearby, was far from easy.

As Li Xun burrowed through earth and stone, he completely lost track of time. And of direction. He didn’t sleep, didn’t eat, just poured all his focus into sensing the pull of the yin qi. After so long, even his senses seemed to fade away, leaving only that faint thread of yin guiding him, growing sharper and sharper.

So when a spark of insight suddenly lit up in his mind, he stopped dead in his tracks.

In that instant, his sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch all came rushing back. The monotonous darkness around him felt alive. The earthy smell of dirt and rocks mixed with the soft sound of dripping water, quiet but creepy.

An underground river…?