Refining the Mountains and Rivers

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The Chief Elder’s eyelids jumped.
“Sect Master, there is no need to worry.
Even if Yao Bin has some skills, how can he possibly subdue the Sealed Pagoda? Just wait for him to taste some pain and then he will be begging for you to rescue him…” Before he could finish speaking his words were clogged up in his throat and he had a horrified expression on his face as if he had seen a ghost.

The little black dot at the base of the Sealed Pagoda was beginning to move upwards.
Although the speed was incomparably slow, the so-called concept of this ‘slow’ referred to a state where one could see it visibly moving with their eyes.

Whether it was Tie Qianqiu or the Chief Elder, they were the highest level figures of the Black Demon Sect.
They had enough status to know about all the records that the Black Demon Sect had kept for the past tens of thousands of years concerning those who had attempted to pass it.
Because of this, they knew just how astonishing this sight before them was.

Out of the recorded 137 attempts, the strongest among those that tried were a peak Blue Sea realm Old Ancestor whose life was nearing its end, and a person who the sect managed to find through a lucky chance that possessed the mythical pure body physique that was impenetrable to myriad poisons.
Out of those two, the first had spent 24 days and the second had spent 17 days to reach the middle of the Sealed Pagoda.
Compared to Yao Bin’s current speed, the difference was so great that it was terrifying.
With this speed, perhaps he would only need two hours to reach the middle.

Tie Qianqiu took a deep breath.
His intuition told him that from this moment on, everything had spun out beyond his control.

…

More and more air masses appeared.
As Qin Yu raced forward, his actions seemed to serve as a provocation to them, or perhaps he had attracted their attention.
But in any case, they all started to gather towards him on their own initiative.
Qin Yu’s figure was submerged within what looked like a storm of violent poisons.

More and more poisons appeared and they were also of increasingly horrifying variations.
But no matter how much they wreaked havoc, they were unable to stop Qin Yu, much less kill him.

After an unknown period of time, the poison air masses that crazily rushed towards Qin Yu all vanished from sight.
The dark gray world became clear and empty, as if everything he had experienced had only been an illusion.
He lifted his right hand and looked at his index finger that was so bright it almost emitted light, and he knew that everything that occurred had been reality.

Had he passed? Qin Yu looked up at the gloomy and depressed gray skies above and slowly shook his head.
Things were likely not this simple.
These poisons were terrifying, but as long as a person was strong enough or skilled enough, they could make it through given enough time.

The Black Demon Sect had held the Sealed Pagoda for tens of thousands of years but they hadn’t managed to make it recognize anyone as its master.
With this in mind, how could Qin Yu underestimate it at all?

Suddenly, the corners of Qin Yu’s robes began to rise.
He looked up into the distance and saw a massive black line connecting the heavens and earth, appearing just at the end of his line of sight.

His pupils shrank and his expression turned dignified.
He quietly thought: It was here!

The thick black line at the end of his line of sight rapidly began to grow as it approached him at an astonishing speed.
As it came, an earthshaking roar accompanied it.

It was close! It was close!

Finally, he could see that within this giant hurricane, there was a massive face.
Its eyes surged with green light and blood red flames leaked out from its mouth.
Its face twisted repeatedly, decaying and resurrecting again and again.

“To those who dare intrude into the forbidden zone – death!”

With a howl, the face rushed out from the hurricane, maliciously biting at Qin Yu.

From within its giant gaping mouth, one could see red light tumbling about, as if there was burning hot magma deep inside.

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Qin Yu looked up, allowing his black robes to swirl around him.
He stared at the large incoming mouth and his feet trod forwards.

Whoosh –

He was like a tiny rock being thrown into a lake.
In the blink of an eye he rushed into the giant mouth.

The face returned to the hurricane.
Its mouth wriggled around as if it were chewing and swallowing.
But soon, it emitted a scream of absolute despair.

The hurricane quickly stormed away, wildly spinning around.
Countless poisons fused with it, supplementing it, but the giant face couldn’t be saved.

The face constantly collapsed and disintegrated.
It wanted to repair itself, but it couldn’t reduce the horrifying swallowing force that erupted within it.

With one final sorrowful scream, the face completely shattered.
Then, in several breaths of time, the hurricane vanished from sight.

Qin Yu’s figure appeared in midair.
He looked at the world which had become empty once more, his eyes flashing.

…

The little square had fallen deathly silent.

The people who had the qualifications to be here were already mentally prepared for how strong Yao Bin was.
But, as they helplessly watched as Yao Bin easily waded his way into the middle level of the Sealed Pagoda in less than an hour, their minds still went completely blank.

Gudong –

It was unknown who gulped first, but in the utter silence it was particularly striking.
The Chief Elder blinked with difficulty and stubbornly stared at the little black dot that was making its way up from the middle of the Pagoda.
It took him a long time but he finally admitted that what he saw was not an illusion.

How was this possible!?

Tie Qianqiu had a complex expression.
The Sealed Pagoda had been left in the Black Demon Sect for tens of thousands of years.
According to the agreement, they were only the keepers of the Sealed Pagoda.
But as more and more time passed, the Black Demon Sect cultivators who had the qualifications to know the truth had all secretly started to regard the Sealed Pagoda as a treasure that belonged to the sect.

But perhaps now, its true master had appeared.

…

What lay in front of Qin Yu was a vast and endless sea.
It splashed around and crashed into the shore.
But, this seawater was actually a still and listless gray, similar to the sky in color.
Just looking at it made one feel fear.

The Sealed Pagoda’s second level – Sea of Poison.
The entire sea was composed of countless different poisons.

Every drop of seawater possessed enough poison to cause total destruction to ten thousand lives.

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Qin Yu tried using other means to cross the sea, such as flying across or sailing on a boat.
But, the truth proved far simpler.

This sea could only be crossed using one’s mortal body.
Only by resisting the corrosive abilities of the Sea of Poison would it be considered as successfully passing.

Even someone like Qin Yu who had regarded poisons as nothing for many years already still felt weak at heart looking at the Sea of Poison.
“Little blue lamp, everything depends on you.
You must give it your best!”

Splash –

With a high jump, Qin Yu dove into the gray sea like a big black fish.
His feet rapidly moved as he swam deep into the sea.

The poisons in the Sea of Poison were indeed strange and terrifying.
They didn’t corrode the inside of one’s body, but directly melted and destroyed one’s mortal body completely.
In simpler words, this Sea of Poison could be considered an incomparably large sea filled with highly concentrated acid.

Even if Qin Yu’s Demon Body had reached a high level he still suffered immediate losses.
His hair and skin instantly began melting away.
Luckily, sensing that things would be bad, he had hidden the Demon God Armor within his body.
Otherwise, this armor that matched with his Demon Body which he still didn’t know how to fully utilize would be completely destroyed.

However, the corrosion of the poisons lasted for only an instant before it was suppressed by the little blue lamp.
Then, the terrifying regenerative abilities of the Demon Body appeared, restoring his skin to how it was in the beginning.

Then, his skin melted away again and regenerated again…cycling back and forth in an endless samsara.

With the Demon Body’s potent strength and this level of weak damage, even if it was repeated 10,000 times it still wouldn’t cause any great losses to him.
But, the key issue here was that every time his skin melted away and was restored, it caused excruciating pain.

Although it was impossible for others to experience this pain personally, it could be roughly described: Imagine if all of your skin was instantly peeled off and then it regrew in the next second.
Then the process continued a second time, a third, a fourth…

It was simply terrifying to imagine!

Even if Qin Yu had a firm will, when he faced this painful attack with no end in sight, his consciousness still inevitably fell into a hazy state.

Fortunately, every time his consciousness seemed as if it would fall dark, the Soul Summoning Bell would spread out fluctuations that pulled him back.

It felt as if 10,000 years passed.
When a terrifying bang rang out, Qin Yu was stunned for several moments before he barely managed to regain his composure.

Then, he discovered that he unknowingly arrived on a lonely island atop the sea.

He didn’t even have time to think about why there would be an island atop the Sea of Poison.
When he leapt out of the seawater, his skin rapidly grew back and in several breaths of time his long black hair was hanging down to his shoulders once more.
With a thought the Demon God Armor reappeared, making his appearance no different than the moment before he leapt into the Sea of Poison.

However, only Qin Yu knew how long and terrifying that skin-peeling pain had been.
He looked ahead at the limitless sea, a lingering fear in his eyes.

At this moment, another loud rumble rang out.
Qin Yu turned and looked towards the depths of the sea.

A black line appeared at the edge of his sight.
It looked like…a continent floating in the sea.

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This island had appeared, so a continent didn’t seem too strange.
Qin Yu didn’t dwell too much on this matter.
He kept his eyes locked tightly on the continent.

The loud bang had come from there.

Qin Yu’s intuition told him that the distant continent was the key to having the Sealed Pagoda recognize a master! But, he didn’t really wish to endure the melting pain he experienced swimming through the Sea of Poison again.
After some experimentation, Qin Yu was pleasantly surprised to find that the suppressing strength above the Sea of Poison had weakened and he was just barely able to fly.

Whoosh –

A beam of light ran out from the island and he shakily flew towards the continent.
The more he approached the continent the weaker the suppressive strength became, allowing his speed to become faster the closer he was.

But soon, he saw the true appearance of this continent deep in the Sea of Poison.
His eyes widened…shock filling his face.

Black continent, black mountains, black plants – this seemed like a world formed from pure darkness.
But, this wasn’t the most creepy and eerie thing.
The entire continent in the Sea of Poison was wrapped up in a sphere of light.

This layer of light was like a cracked egg.
There were cracks running all over it, and in some places there were even some small breakages.

Suddenly, a volcano erupted on the black continent.
Billowing black flames and black smoke broke into the skies, condensing into a fierce skeleton that ruthlessly stabbed a black bone spear at the sphere of light.

Qin Yu watched the sphere of light tremble.
At the striking point, he saw several cracks appear.
He finally understood where that loud bang had come from.

The skeleton broke apart, dissolving into endless black smoke.
When the black smoke fell onto the earth, it fused back within.

That erupting volcano suddenly wriggled like an opening mouth.
It emitted excited roars, “Your strength is nearly exhausted! I will soon emerge!”

The sphere of light was silent.
But, faint traces of light continuously gathered at the cracked point, condensing into an arrow of light that shot into the mouth of the volcano.

The ground violently trembled and flames split open the earth.
Pained roars mixed with raucous and laugh-filled howls spread out from deep below.
An arrogant and cruel voice shouted, “When I leave, a trillion lives will perish as my sacrifice!”

The shattered earth rapidly recovered.
The sphere of light quieted back down.
But, the originally weak light was a tiny bit dimmer than before.

As Qin Yu was stunned, a surprising scene occurred in front of him.
Faint traces of lightly slowly flowed, gathering and condensing into the phantom of a person.
“If it were only a thousand years earlier, I would have been overjoyed by your arrival.
But, it is already too late.”

This phantom had a blurry face and its voice was even and calm.
Still, one could hear the exhaustion and helplessness that filled every word.

Qin Yu hesitated for a moment, “You are?”

The light phantom replied, “The spirit of the Sealed Pagoda.”

Qin Yu looked towards the continent, “That is?”

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The light phantom lightly said, “The Spirit of Poison, a mistake that never should have existed.” After a pause, it continued to say, “The Myriad Poison Sect was destroyed because of it.
I have endured for tens of thousands of years, but in the end I cannot escape the fate of collapsing.
Once it escapes from the Sealed Pagoda, it will become a catastrophe descending upon the world.
Trillions of lives will perish before it.”

Qin Yu’s heart skipped a beat.
It felt as if he had bumped into some extraordinary secret.
But, right now was not the time to be curious.
“What can I do?”

“There is nothing you can do.
I originally thought that if a person can rush here, they should be of sufficient strength.
If they joined together with me, we might have a 30-40% chance…but now…” The light phantom couldn’t help but reveal disappointment in its voice.

Qin Yu didn’t feel any anger at being belittled.
This was because he had to admit that in front of the Sealed Pagoda’s spirit and the Spirit of Poison, they both had the strength to absolutely crush him.

“Leave.
Tell those of the Black Demon Sect to flee and evacuate everyone within ten million miles…I cannot last much longer.”

“Wait!” Qin Yu decisively said.
“Do you think that the Black Demon Sect will obediently give up their lands that they have lived on for countless years just because of a few words from me? And even relocate their entire sect? Even if they are willing to do so, would every single person within 10 million miles really be able to flee? I fear that in the end, all that will happen is a disaster!”

The light phantom fell silent.
“…I’ve done everything I can.”

Qin Yu said in a high tone, “Maybe you can let me try.”

“You have no chance.”

“If I can arrive here today, I naturally have my reasons.”

The light phantom shook its head.
“If you walk in, the Spirit of Poison will seize your body and be separated from my suppression.
The only reason it was stranded here for such a long time is because its main body is too large, thus it cannot escape.”

Qin Yu earnestly said, “Even if I don’t go in, how long can you last? Ten years or a hundred years? This is only a short period of time.
Then why not let me try? Believe me, whether it is the Spirit of Poison or anything else, I really don’t fear it!”

On the face of the light phantom, a pair of eyes suddenly brightened.
It looked at Qin Yu for a moment and then said, “Alright.”

With this, Qin Yu actually paused for a moment.
Although he knew this question was stupid, he still couldn’t help but ask it.

“Can you tell me why you changed your mind so easily?”

The light phantom lightly said, “My previous master told me that there are no idiots in this world, especially when it comes to cultivators with profound levels of strength.
You are so young and yet you managed to reach Blue Sea, so you should be smart.
And smart people won’t often bring about their own destruction.
That is, unless they let their smarts override their minds.”

This was a slightly familiar saying…

Qin Yu rubbed his nose.
“Don’t worry.
You will soon discover that trusting me is the most correct decision you have ever made.”

“I hope so.” The light phantom’s eyes were deep and profound.
“I wish you good luck.”

Shua –

There was no time for Qin Yu to prepare at all.
Like a stone, he passed through the sphere of light and crashed into the black continent.