Chapter 624: Corpses at the Bottom of the Pool

The distress message repeated seven or eight times before finally stopping.

But the Great Guardian's mind was blown. Clearly, this wasn't the Primordial Celestial Venerate fishing; there was no fishing like this.

Nor did it seem like the actions of the Pure Yang Sect Leader after going completely mad; that would inevitably involve a massacre, not repeating bizarre messages.

So, had the Pure Yang Sect Leader really discovered some secret, but gotten into some kind of trouble?

The Great Guardian thought for a moment, then quickly retrieved materials and inscribed spirit rune formations on the ground, imitating the Zhou Tian Star Array.

The reason he didn't call was because he worried that if it was a trap set by the Five Elements Alliance, the call could be located using their technology.

As a Night Watcher, he fluently and rapidly drew the star formation that even Star Officials struggled to learn in years, sat cross-legged, and began his deductions.

A dozen minutes later, the celestial phenomena showed that neither answering the phone nor going to Songhai would encounter danger.

The Great Guardian thought for a moment, then rose and waved his hand, causing the spirit rune formation on the ground to disappear. He then picked up the phone on the table and dialed the Pure Yang Sect Leader's number.

"Beep beep~"

The ringing tone sounded a few times, and then the call connected. The Pure Yang Sect Leader's signature cold voice came through:

"Why contact me? Our cooperation has come to an end, unless you can feed me a Star Official or a Dream Weaver. Then I will consider continuing the cooperation."

The Great Guardian listened to the voice from the speaker and was stunned for a moment.

This tone and attitude didn't sound like a cry for help, and even less like he wanted to share earth-shattering secrets.

Filled with doubt, the Great Guardian said in a deep voice:

"What happened? You sent me a distress message not long ago."

"I asked you for help?" Unexpectedly, the Pure Yang Sect Leader was even more astonished than him: "What nonsense are you talking about?"

"Why don't you check your own phone?"

"There's nothing on my phone. Why don't you check your own phone too?"

The Great Guardian moved the phone away, selected hands-free, and checked his messages. When his eyes fell on the phone screen, his pupils shrank suddenly, like a cat's eyes in bright light.

The chat history was blank.

The message the Pure Yang Sect Leader had just sent was gone.

The Great Guardian was greatly alarmed, and his tone changed: "Pure Yang, what did you encounter in Songhai? Who are you investigating? Is anyone around you?"

His voice was not only urgent but also loud, as if he had been stimulated by something.

"You..." The Pure Yang Sect Leader hesitated for a moment, "What on earth happened to you!"

"It's not what happened to me, it's what happened to you. You're in big trouble." The Great Guardian immediately told the other party about the distress message he had received, and the phenomenon of the message mysteriously disappearing.

"This..." The Pure Yang Sect Leader felt a chill down his spine as he listened, both shocked and suspicious. If it was really as the Great Guardian said, then he was indeed in trouble. But everything was calm on his side, and nothing had happened.

"Who are you investigating? What key point did you find?" The Great Guardian asked in quick succession.

"I'm investigating..."

The Pure Yang Sect Leader had just said three words when the phone cut off.

The Great Guardian quickly redialed, but the phone was busy and couldn't be connected.

Something had happened. The Pure Yang Sect Leader had encountered something in Songhai. Some mysterious and unknown force had forcibly erased the sent message and kept the Pure Yang Sect Leader, the person involved, in the dark... The Great Guardian's mind raced. Who in Songhai had this ability?

And what kind of power could reverse reality?

At this moment, the phone "dinged," indicating that a message had arrived.

The Great Guardian looked closely. The message was from the Pure Yang Sect Leader.

"Come to Songhai immediately. I've discovered an earth-shattering secret."

"Help!"

"Come to Songhai immediately. I've discovered an earth-shattering secret."

"Help!"

The message started repeating again.

This time, the Great Guardian didn't immediately call to ask the Pure Yang Sect Leader, but instead held the phone and stood in the dimly lit study, waiting silently.

His eyes stared fixedly at the phone screen, at the dense distress messages. After about half an hour, suddenly one message disappeared.

Then, the second message disappeared.

The third and fourth messages... The messages on the phone screen were disappearing one by one as if they were being recalled. Time seemed to be flowing backward at this moment.

At this moment, the Great Guardian's hair stood on end.

He finally realized what the Pure Yang Sect Leader had encountered.

A causal item!

Only causal items had such terrifying power. Only causal items could erase the fact of something that already existed and create a phenomenon like the reversal of time.

What was this guy investigating that involved causal items?!

Immediately contact the leader... Without hesitation, the Great Guardian quickly retrieved materials rich in spiritual energy and inscribed a summoning spirit rune symbolizing Ling Tuo on the ground.

The difficulty of the summoning formation seemed to be much higher than simulating the Zhou Tian Star Array. The Great Guardian was like a Night Wanderer learning spirit runes for the first time, drawing each stroke very carefully, very carefully.

A full hour passed before the summoning circle took shape.

The Great Guardian immediately transferred the power of the Sun God, activating the formation. The circle automatically extracted the spiritual essence of the materials, summoning the existence in the dark.

"Leader, Leader, Leader..."

The Great Guardian summoned in a low voice.

However, the summoning circle was silent, without any anomalies or sounds.

This meant that the leader was doing something else and didn't have time to respond to him.

"Strange, the leader should be free recently. Why isn't he responding..." The Great Guardian muttered in confusion.

At this moment, the phone on the desk rang. The caller was the Pure Yang Sect Leader.

The Great Guardian's eyes lit up. The Pure Yang Sect Leader had chosen to call instead of sending a text message, indicating that he had broken some kind of cycle.

The Great Guardian quickly picked up the phone, answered the call, and tentatively said "Hello."

"It's me!"

The Pure Yang Sect Leader's tired voice came from the speaker: "I think I might need help. I'm in trouble."

"You really broke out of the cycle?" The Great Guardian was a little surprised. After all, causal items were the most unsolvable and troublesome of the three types of items.

"What cycle?" The Pure Yang Sect Leader was taken aback.

"Hmm? It seems you've forgotten everything you did two hours ago. In that case, how did you know you were in trouble?" The Great Guardian asked calmly.

The Pure Yang Sect Leader paused for a few seconds and said:

"These past few days, I've been investigating the Primordial Celestial Venerate. I investigated a retired old teacher's home. I'm standing in the stairwell of his building right now, planning to knock on the door and pay a visit.

"As far as I know, I just arrived here and haven't met the old teacher yet. However, I clearly remember coming at ten in the morning, and it's now twelve-thirty in the afternoon.

"Moreover, my soul is extremely exhausted, so exhausted that I want to sleep for three days and three nights. I feel like a part of my soul is missing. If I'm not mistaken, I should have used Fleeting Bloom on myself. This is an extremely profound forgetting technique that can make people forget specific memories."

After speaking, the Pure Yang Sect Leader asked, "What was that cycle you mentioned earlier?"

The Great Guardian didn't answer immediately, but instead asked, "Are you sure you're safe?"

"I can't be sure," the Pure Yang Sect Leader said. "But I can observe for a while. I've already gone downstairs and plan to leave this residential area. If there are no abnormalities after half an hour, then it means I'm safe."

The two didn't speak anymore. Half an hour passed like this. The Pure Yang Sect Leader said with a sigh of relief:

"It seems I'm safe. Tell me about it."

The Great Guardian then described his experience earlier, word for word.

The phone went silent. The Pure Yang Sect Leader seemed to be under a petrifying curse. It took a long, long time before a murmuring voice came through:

"I see, I see..."

He took a deep breath and analyzed in a solemn tone:

"I didn't suffer an attack, which means I didn't encounter a terrible enemy. But I did get caught in some kind of cycle. In two and a half hours, I repeatedly experienced investigation, seeking help, and forgetting, until I myself realized that something was wrong and used 'Fleeting Bloom' to erase my memories.

"I think I may have found out some incredible things, thus triggering the power of the causal item and getting caught in that cycle. When I erased my memory and forgot that secret, the cause and effect were eliminated. Hmm, it's also possible that after I noticed something was wrong, I chose to leave instead of going to see that retired teacher, so the causal cycle was broken."

The Great Guardian's voice was also extremely solemn: "So, what exactly did you find out? The Primordial Celestial Venerate's true identity?"

The Pure Yang Sect Leader chuckled:

"The true identity of a mere Primordial Celestial Venerate isn't qualified to attract the influence of causal magic items. But one thing is certain, the Primordial Celestial Venerate's true identity is related to some earth-shattering secret.

"What trapped me in the cycle wasn't the Primordial Celestial Venerate's true identity, but the secret that was drawn out by his identity."

Although he was already crazy, the Pure Yang Sect Leader's intelligence was still there.

"The Primordial Celestial Venerate's true identity involves a secret of an extremely high level, hiss~" The Great Guardian sucked in a breath of cold air.

It wasn't that the Primordial Celestial Venerate was related to that secret, but that his real identity was related to the secret. This meant that the Primordial Celestial Venerate's true background was extraordinary.

He wasn't a grassroots The Way of the Extraordinary?

"So, Great Guardian, how much is Dark Night Rose willing to pay to buy the identity information and home address of that retired teacher?" the Pure Yang Sect Leader said.

The Great Guardian on the other end of the phone was silent for a moment. "If it involves causal items, then it's not something we can participate in. Even the leader would be in danger. I can't contact him right now."

"Alright!" The Pure Yang Sect Leader said faintly, "I'll wait for your leader's reply."

........

No. 15 dungeon, Sīmìng Palace.

The vast forest stretches endlessly. This primeval forest, whose end cannot be seen, is evergreen, never withering, and always bursting with vigorous vitality.

But if you look closely, you will find that the details contain terror.

Every tree has an ugly human face. The densely drooping vines will occasionally wrap around passing beasts and, regardless of their resistance, stuff them into their mouths and chew.

The bushes emit white smoke that causes hallucinations and paralysis, confusing passing animals. Beneath the dense bushes lie dense animal bones.

The snakes, insects, rats, ants, birds, and beasts in the forest have become plants, but they can never be eaten. The rate of reproduction is astonishing. A batch is eaten, and another batch is born.

And parasitic plants are the natural enemies of trees, greedily absorbing their essence.

According to the Spirit Realm's introduction, this place was the blessed land of Sīmìng, the Star Lord of Life, in ancient times. It was nourished by the primordial life fluid, so this forest can remain evergreen.

But since Sīmìng, the Star Lord of Life, died, the power of the life domain fell into chaos, causing the flora and fauna in the forest to mutate.

In the center of the forest are ruins formed after the collapse of a palace. The mottled walls, cracked stone steps, and collapsed pavilions all show the vicissitudes of time.

Judging from the hundreds of acres of land and one palace after another connected together, one can imagine how magnificent and luxurious the original Sīmìng Star Lord's palace was.

Xie Su, who had passed through the many deadly traps in the forest, arrived at the core of the palace—the Spring of Rebirth.

It is located in the very center of the palace. This is a pool of water thirty meters long and ten meters wide. The golden liquid is as calm as gold foil, reflecting the sky and the ruins of the palace.

The edge of the pool is made of white jade-like stones and railings.

According to the records in Xie's family database, the greatest marvel of Sīmìng Palace is this Spring of Rebirth. The spring water is concentrated primordial life fluid, and the mud at the bottom of the spring has the function of shaping the physical body.

Half a century ago, when Xie's ancestor was still a Dominator, he had entered Sīmìng Palace. Xie's family has a guide to Sīmìng Palace.

Xie Su stood by the pool, recalling the contents of the dungeon guide.

The guide to clearing the Spring of Rebirth is simple: dive into the pool, collect the mud at the bottom, and create a clone. This will clear the dungeon.

At first glance, it seems simple.

But the power of the life domain in the dungeon has long been out of control and chaotic. Once a living body is thrown into the Spring of Rebirth, it will automatically create evil clones. The longer you stay at the bottom of the pool, the more clones there will be.

The The Way of the Extraordinary needs to collect the mud before the number of clones exceeds their own limit and purify the chaotic power within it with Sīmìng's spiritual power to create a pure and flawless clone in order to clear the dungeon.

There are no fancy rules, but the difficulty is extremely high.

Back then, the ancestor was almost beaten to death by his own clones.

As a reward, the clone can be taken out of the Spirit Realm and become a perfect puppet.

Xie Su sat cross-legged by the pool, healed the wounds on his body, and restored his physical strength, spirit, and spiritual power to their best condition. Then, he plunged into the spring water.

The pool looks small, but it is actually extremely deep.

Xie Su gracefully moved his limbs and swam toward the bottom of the pool. Near the bottom, he saw broken bodies lying quietly on the golden mud.

It's Zhu Xueyi. He also entered Sīmìng Palace? He's wearing bell-bottoms and a floral shirt. It seems to be something from twenty or thirty years ago... Xie Su examined the corpses and recognized the other party's identity.

One of the elders of the Zhu family.

He bypassed this area and continued to swim forward. Before long, he saw another pile of broken bodies lying like garbage. They were wearing Zhongshan suits, with crane-like hair and youthful faces, and handsome features. It was the ancestor.

I have to get to the bottom of the pool quickly to collect and refine the mud. I feel like life forms are starting to be born in the pool... Xie Su quickened his pace. Soon, he saw a large pile of broken corpses stacked in front of him.

This made him a little strange. Dominators have long dungeon cycles, Dominator-level dungeons have as many as 99, the Spirit Realm has been around for a hundred years, and there aren't many Sīmìng dungeons... If you calculate it this way, a difficult, Dominator-level solo Spirit Realm shouldn't have been cleared by so many people.

At this moment, as he worked hard to swim, he saw the faces of those corpses clearly.

Handsome features, with a hint of childishness, wearing ordinary t-shirts and shorts... Xie Su suddenly stopped, as if struck by lightning.

The Primordial Celestial Venerate?

It's the Primordial Celestial Venerate!

One corpse after another of the Primordial Celestial Venerate was spread on the golden mud.

........

ps: After accompanying Cai Zong, I stayed up all night to write a chapter. Bosses, please calm down. I still love you. Going to sleep, so sleepy~