The Black-Armored Ao watched the two brats plunge off the cliff. Wary of the sinister aura lingering at the bottom of the abyss, it hesitated for a long time, not daring to draw closer.
Shaking its thick, massive claws, it grumbled and turned to leave.
Below the cliff was indeed still the sea, but it was ridiculously dark, so pitch-black that one couldn't even see their own hand in front of their face.
Xue Mingzhao frowned and activated her Heavenly Eye to scan the surroundings.
Strange. She had looked closely from above earlier, and the bottom was completely empty, without the slightest hint of any living creature's aura.
Could this toxic gas be emerging from deep underground?
“Are you sure you didn't smell wrong?” she muttered in her mind.
The Chaos Spiritual Root's tone was absolute. “Absolutely not! It's right below! How dare you doubt me!”
She didn't dwell on it any further and continued diving down with Su Ye.
As they swam, they hit an invisible barrier with a soft thud.
There was actually a barrier here.
Xue Mingzhao channeled her spiritual energy to push hard against the barrier, but it remained completely motionless.
The two of them tried various methods in turn, but they still couldn't penetrate the barrier.
Just as they were about to give up and return empty-handed, a powerful suction suddenly surged from within the barrier.
The surrounding seawater churned and pulled violently. The immense force, like a bottomless black hole, dragged Xue Mingzhao relentlessly inside the barrier.
Xue Mingzhao gasped, “Holy crap—”
Su Ye was quick to react and grabbed her arm, but as a result, he was sucked in along with her.
After a few seconds of dizziness, the two of them suddenly appeared in midair, landing with a hard thud on the solid ground.
Xue Mingzhao grimaced in pain. She rubbed her bottom as she scrambled up, and when she looked up—
She was completely dumbfounded.
Above them was a domed stone ceiling, and the surroundings were incredibly dry, without a single drop of seawater.
A vast amount of spiritual energy surged in the air, but it was mixed with a dense, black toxic fog.
The spiritual energy was so dense it had almost materialized, but the concentration of the toxic gas was equally terrifying.
If an ordinary cultivator inhaled even a single breath, they would succumb to the poison in an instant.
Compared to this, what lay further ahead was even more shocking.
Deep within the vast space lay a colossal dragon skeleton.
It stretched as far as the eye could see from head to tail, with bones as massive as small hills. Grayish-black toxic gas continuously seeped from the fine cracks in the bones, rising slowly in wisps, looking no different from thick smoke billowing from a farmhouse chimney.
Xue Mingzhao stared up at it for so long her neck grew sore.
Good grief, just how massive was this dragon when it was alive!
Thud!
A dull sound rang out.
Xue Mingzhao turned her head and saw Su Ye's face turn pale. His body went limp, and he collapsed straight to the ground.
Oh no, the toxic gas emitted by this poisonous dragon was too strong. In just an instant, her senior brother had collapsed.
Xue Mingzhao quickly stepped forward to support him. She hastily opened her storage bag, took out a porcelain bottle, poured out a detoxifying pill, and fed it to Su Ye.
As the pill slid down his throat, a cool sensation spread, and Su Ye finally recovered.
He looked at the endless dragon skeleton, his voice trembling. “Junior Sister... wh-what kind of monster is this, emitting toxic gas from its entire body? For a moment, I actually thought I saw my great-grandfather.”
At this moment, Cang Jue's voice rang out in Xue Mingzhao's mind, carrying a hint of disbelief. “This aura... is it Zhuyuan?”
“Zhuyuan?”
“A descendant of the Torch Dragon, a Scion of the Abyss. They are the oldest branch of the ancient dragon clan, and they are poisonous from head to toe—their blood, bones, and scales are all toxic. Even a single speck of their dust could kill a person.”
Cang Jue's voice was grave. “Tens of thousands of years ago, during the internal strife of the dragon clan, the lineage of the poison dragons was nearly wiped out. I didn't expect a skeleton to be hidden here.”
He paused, then added, “It has been dead for at least ten thousand years, and most of its toxic gas has already dissipated. If it had just died, and the two of you inhaled even a breath, you would be completely dead by now.”
Xue Mingzhao clicked her tongue in amazement.
Impressive. It had been dead for ten thousand years and could still scare the sea beasts of the surrounding waters away. Just how fierce must it have been when it was alive?
Driven by curiosity, she took a couple of steps forward and touched a dragon tooth that was taller than she was.
Right at that moment, a blurry voice pierced straight into her mind—
“Kill her!”
Xue Mingzhao froze.
Who was speaking?
“Kill her!” The voice rang out again, its tone carrying an unyielding authority.
“Only by killing... can...” The voice became increasingly faint, as if separated by thousands of layers of time and space, before completely fading away.
Kill whom?
Why kill them?
In her daze, an anxious shout suddenly pulled her consciousness back.
“Junior Sister! Junior Sister, wake up!”
Su Ye's voice exploded in her ears. Xue Mingzhao snapped back to reality, only to see Su Ye shaking her shoulders while clutching three or four detoxifying pills, trying to make her eat them.
“No, no, no, I'm fine!” Xue Mingzhao hastily stopped him.
Su Ye looked lingeringly terrified. “You suddenly stopped moving just now, staring blankly as if you had lost your soul! I thought you were poisoned!”
Xue Mingzhao frowned and asked Cang Jue and the Chaos Spiritual Root in her mind, “Did either of you hear someone speaking just now?”
Cang Jue replied, “No, Boss. What's wrong?”
The Chaos Spiritual Root mocked, “What voice? You couldn't have hallucinated from being scared by this pile of bones, right?”
Xue Mingzhao turned and asked Su Ye, “Senior Brother, did you hear any voice just now?”
Su Ye shook his head blankly. “No. Other than the two of us, there's no sound at all here.”
Xue Mingzhao looked at the dragon skeleton. “This skeleton seems to be speaking.”
Cang Jue sensed it for a moment. “Boss, are you imagining things? This skeleton is as dead as dead can be.”
Xue Mingzhao stared at the colossal dragon skeleton, deep in thought.
It wasn't a hallucination.
She had clearly heard it.
But why was she the only one who could hear it?
As she was pondering, the Chaos Spiritual Root suddenly spoke up, “The toxic gas is seeping out from here! If you move it away, won't the spiritual energy in the Eastern Territory be clean?”
Xue Mingzhao nodded. There was nothing wrong with this logic.
But she quickly noticed something else was amiss—the spiritual energy here was so dense that it was almost condensing into spirit marrow, yet none of it seemed to be spilling outside. Instead, it was continuously gathering toward a certain direction.
The two of them exchanged a look.
“Let's go take a look.”
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